Reproductive Justice

Reproductive justice is a framework created by Black women and women of color in the 1990s. It refers to the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy and have children, not have children, and/or parent children in safe and sustainable environments.

Why Attacks on Immigrant Communities Are Reproductive Justice Issues

PUBLISHED 7/22/2026 by , and

“It’s hell.”

That’s how our colleague, Miri, described her months-long detention in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas, last year, separated from her husband and four children. Food was inedible, medications were inaccessible and women were forced to share beds and blankets due to overcrowding. She witnessed guards sexually assault women and conduct invasive strip searches. Pregnant and breastfeeding people were neglected: One new mother suffered from mastitis, while another woman in labor was ignored for hours before being taken to a hospital. 

These horrors, perpetrated by immigration enforcement officers, are exactly what the federal government approved billions to fund this summer. 

Reproductive justice is often reduced to abortion rights. But the movement has always taken a broader view. Created by 12 Black women organizers, the reproductive justice framework is about the right to have—or to not have—children and the right to raise them in safe, healthy communities. Detentions, deportations and disruption of care are part of a broader effort to limit who can fully belong, safely build a family and have rights in the United States. 

So who deserves safety and belonging in the U.S.? 

Todd Blanche Suggests He Is Open to Using the DOJ to Restrict Mailing the Abortion Pill

PUBLISHED 7/17/2026 by | UPDATED 8/4/2026 at 10:13 A.M. PT

Antiabortion Republican senators scored a major win from embattled acting Attorney General Todd Blanche during his contentious confirmation hearing to lead the Department of Justice.

Texas Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz used Wednesday’s hearing to press Blanche to restrict access to the abortion pill mifepristone, and Blanche ultimately agreed to revisit the current Department of Justice interpretation of the 1873 Comstock Act, which allows the nationwide mailing of the abortion pill under certain circumstances.

The Antiabortion Movement Has a New Plan for a National Abortion Ban

PUBLISHED 7/14/2026 by | UPDATED 8/4/2026 at 10:13 A.M. PT

Judges, lawyers and sexual abuse survivors have raised very strong reasons why it would be reckless and unconscionable for the Senate to confirm Todd Blanche to the post of Attorney General of the United States. One of the under-reported issues, though, is Blanche’s backing from well-funded antiabortion groups.

If the Republican Congress confirms Blanche, he could weaponize the DOJ in service of the antiabortion machine’s wish list, increasing the potential for some of the biggest blows to abortion access since Dobbs. 

Blanche’s confirmation could mean the further decimation of access to abortion healthcare in the United States at the behest of the antiabortion machine, which has already successfully pressured the Trump administration to meet its demands by, for example, calling for FDA head Martin Mackary to be fired. Meanwhile, the antiabortion machine is ratcheting up the pressure to push its agenda at various levels across the U.S.

Reasonable members of Congress who believe in the independence of the DOJ from outside pressure, including that of the administration itself, will vote to oppose Blanche’s nomination for U.S. attorney general. 

A Federal Court Just Struck Down Idaho Abortion Restrictions. The Win Could Set the Stage for a Bigger Fight at the Ballot Box.

PUBLISHED 7/5/2026 by | UPDATED 8/17/2026 at 7:31 A.M. PT

When most people think about post-Dobbs abortion litigation, they assume every lawsuit is trying to overturn the Supreme Court’s decision. But a groundbreaking case in Idaho charts a different course. Brought by maternal-fetal medicine specialist Dr. Stacy Seyb, the lawsuit argues that medically necessary abortion care is protected by a constitutional right Dobbs never addressed: the fundamental right to self-preservation.

To understand this novel legal strategy, I spoke with Wendy Heipt, a senior attorney at Legal Voice and a member of Seyb’s legal team. Rather than asking the courts to revive Roe, Heipt argues that no state can force a pregnant person to sacrifice their life or health by denying medically necessary care.

“This case isn’t about abortion,” she told me. “It’s about self-defense.”

If the courts agree, the case could establish a new constitutional framework for protecting pregnant women facing medical emergencies—even under the legal landscape created by Dobbs.

It is a reminder that some of the most consequential battles over reproductive freedom may turn not on revisiting old precedents, but on recognizing constitutional protections the Supreme Court never considered.

War on Women Report: Trump Administration Defines Embryos as ‘Children,’ Eliminates LGBTQ Veteran Healthcare *and* Guts Teen Pregnancy Prevention Programs

PUBLISHED 7/1/2026 by and

MAGA Republicans are back in the White House, and Project 2025 is their guide: the right-wing plan to turn back the clock on women’s rights, remove abortion access, and force women into roles as wives and mothers in the “ideal, natural family structure.”

We know an empowered female electorate is essential to democracy. That’s why day after day, we stay vigilant in our goals to dismantle patriarchy at every turn. We are watching, and we refuse to go back. This is the War on Women Report.

Since our last report:
—This month marked the fourth anniversary of Dobbs. Today, 41 states have some form of abortion restrictions in place, including 13 states that ban abortion entirely.
—HHS has terminated 53 of its 67 grants for the federal Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program, totaling about $68 million and affecting grantees in two dozen states.
—Two family planning programs sued the Trump administration for curtailing the Title X grant program, which funded clinics providing reproductive healthcare services to low-income patients.

… and more.

The Antiabortion Playbook Is Coming for Birth Control

PUBLISHED 6/29/2026 by

The United States is on its way to banning or severely restricting birth control.

I know this statement will be met with incredulity—but I would refer you to the disbelief so many of us in the reproductive health field faced when we warned that the constitutional right to abortion was in danger. Nearly four years later, we are living in this reality that so many dismissed as alarmist fantasy.

If the anti-contraception tactics we see today look extremely familiar, it’s because they come straight from the antiabortion playbook: spreading mis- and disinformation, advancing incremental regressive policies, and denying problems with access—the same tactics that helped pave the way for the eventual overturning of Roe.

TV Still Has a Lot to Learn About Abortion

PUBLISHED 6/25/2026 by

Four years after Dobbs, television has become more willing to acknowledge the legal and political barriers to abortion care—but too often, it still reinforces harmful myths.

While shows like Grey’s Anatomy have depicted the devastating consequences of abortion bans, others continue to fall back on familiar tropes. In And Just Like That, the show largely sidesteps abortion as a normal, legitimate choice—especially for an affluent married mother in New York. And recently, the critically acclaimed Margo’s Got Money Troubles builds its entire premise around a young woman rejecting abortion despite pressure from those around her.

Those storytelling choices matter. Research shows that accurate abortion storylines can increase public understanding, reduce stigma and even help people feel more confident in their own reproductive healthcare decisions.

Yet television still rarely reflects the reality of abortion today—from the fact that most abortion patients are already parents, to the widespread use of medication abortion.

In an era of widespread confusion and misinformation, TV has the power to inform millions of viewers, but only if it moves beyond outdated narratives and portrays abortion as the ordinary healthcare decision it is for so many people.

What We Learned When We Stayed: What 50 Years of Care in the South Taught Us About Abortion and Trans Rights

PUBLISHED 6/24/2026 by and

We’ve been here before.

When Dobbs v. Jackson came for abortion care in our states, we did two things: We opened clinics across state lines so our patients would still have a legal option. And we stayed. We kept our original clinics open, expanding the care we’d always offered or always wanted to offer.

When U.S. v. Skrmetti came for gender-affirming care, we kept providing that too, because abortion care patients and transgender patients are not separate communities.

The calculation patients make before they walk through the door is identical for both communities: Will I be seen? Will I be safe? Will the person across from me treat my body with humanity, or like a problem to be managed?

June marks anniversaries of both Dobbs and Skrmetti, and that conviction has never felt more urgent. Long before these two cases, the intersection of abortion rights and trans rights was already living in our waiting rooms; in the patients who received reproductive care and gender-affirming hormone therapy under the same roof; in the person who drove hours across the state because we were the only provider they trusted; and in those who trust us with their whole-person care because their grandmothers, mothers, sisters, aunts and friends have relied on our clinics for care for 50 years.

Between our two organizations, we’ve earned a century’s worth of experience at the practice of staying and enduring. CHOICES has kept their doors open for 52 years, and the Women’s Health Centers of West Virginia and Maryland will celebrate 50 years of care on June 24—the same day Roe v. Wade was overturned four years ago.

Support independent clinics in hard places keeping the doors open. And when the next fight comes, show up for the communities under pressure. Remember that those targeted first won’t be the last, but they will be the ones to lead the way.

‘Access to Reproductive Choices Gave Me the Freedom To…’: 12 Answers We Can’t Stop Thinking About

PUBLISHED 6/23/2026 by

Four years after Dobbs, it’s clear that reproductive freedom is not an abstract political issue. It is the freedom to build a life.

This week, we’re launching The Majority campaign—and we want you in it. The ask is simple: Finish the sentence, “Access to reproductive choices gave me the freedom to …”

The responses so far are from women and men, parents and nonparents, abortion patients and birth control users, people who needed miscarriage care, gender-affirming healthcare, fertility treatment, or simply the ability to decide their own future.

These are some of the stories we can’t stop thinking about.