In a terrifying escalation of the post-Roe crackdown, Republican lawmakers in multiple states are pushing laws that would allow women to be charged with murder—and even face the death penalty—for having an abortion.
Roe v. Wade
Roe v. Wade (1973) was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case affirming the right to abortion and upholding the right to make personal decisions about their family, relationships and bodily autonomy. In a devastating 2022 decision, the Court reversed Roe v. Wade, abandoning almost 50 years of precedent on the fundamental right to privacy. Overturning Roe v. Wade has had catastrophic consequences for people across America, as over a dozen states issued trigger bans.
They Were Critically Ill. Abortion Could Have Saved Their Lives. They Weren’t Given the Option.
We don’t have the full picture of what abortion bans have wrought. We might never know the full scope of the damage, because the same people leveling these brutalities are the ones in charge of tracking them.
Instead, what we have are snapshots: data pulled by intrepid reporters. Women and their families brave enough to speak to the press. Doctors willing to speak anonymously with careful researchers.
Forced to Carry a Dying Baby, This Texas Mother of Four Says She Didn’t Think It Could Happen to Her
Samantha Casiano, an east Texas mother of four, tells her story of life and loss:
“I found out that my baby daughter had no chance of being able to live outside my womb at my 20-week ultrasound. … I felt that what happened to us should be everybody’s business. The people in power in Texas forced me to give birth with their abortion ban. I wanted everyone to know who Halo was and how she suffered.
“We all try to visit Halo’s grave every Sunday, and we’ll have a party for her second birthday on March 29 with a cake. We call her birthday her ‘Freedom Day.’ The day she was born is the day she was finally free to go to heaven. She shouldn’t have been on this earth, but the state of Texas forced her to be here, and she fought a fight we all knew she would lose.”
On America’s 250th Anniversary, Let’s Remember Women’s Stories: The Ms. Q&A with Jill Hasday
The United States’ 250th anniversary in 2026 presents an opportunity to include women in the stories America tells about itself, according to Jill Hasday, author of the important new book, We the Men: How Forgetting Women’s Struggles for Equality Perpetuates Inequality.
We the Men tells the stories “of so many women who deserve to be remembered,” said Hasday. It also explores the ways in which forgetting women’s ongoing struggles for equality has perpetuated injustice and promote complacency. Remembering women’s stories more often and more accurately can help the nation advance toward sex equality.
Trump’s Executive Order on IVF Is Full of Red Flags
The White House issued an executive order last week entitled “Expanding Access To In Vitro Fertilization.” The language it employs, and the sheer folly of what it promises, mark it as a double affront to democracy.
I turned to Rutgers Law Professor Kimberly Mutcherson, expert in bioethics and reproductive health, law and technology, to unpack exactly what is at stake for both reproductive health and democracy. Here are four red flags she raised.
Justice on Their Terms: Empowering Plaintiffs Through Anonymity
The day that a survivor of sexual abuse files a lawsuit is a difficult and painful day, but also one that starts a journey toward justice.
For many plaintiffs, stepping forward is not only the start of a legal proceeding but also an act of immense courage. It often involves sharing deeply personal and traumatic experiences with the court and, potentially, the public. This is why plaintiffs must have the option and privacy protection to have their cases filed under pseudonyms.
This issue is at the center of a recent high-profile case against Sean “Diddy” Combs, U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil ruled that a woman suing under the pseudonym “Jane Doe” must reveal her real name or face dismissal of her lawsuit.
‘They’re Coming After Birth Control’: Rep. Lizzie Fletcher on the Fight for Contraceptive Rights
Despite overwhelming public support for contraception access, Republicans continue to block legislation protecting it. Rep. Lizzie Fletcher explains why the fight for birth control rights is more urgent than ever.
“The same people who have been crusading against abortion rights for decades aren’t stopping there. They have their eyes set on contraception and birth control.”
‘Daddy’s Home’: Republican Paternalism Towards Women Exemplifies Punishment, Not Protection
On the first day of his second term in office, Trump signed the “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism” executive order, which claims to defend and protect women by asserting that, as a matter of U.S. policy, the existence of transgender people will not be recognized. Trump followed up on Feb. 5 with his “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” executive order. These EOs join a long history of laws in the U.S. based on professed protection for women, which actually do the opposite.
While posturing as women’s protectors, Republican lawmakers ignore or inadequately address very real, substantiated and systemic threats to women, including in the intimate space of their own homes, where as many as one in four women experience domestic violence and more than three women are killed by husbands or boyfriends every day.
Women’s intelligence is insulted—and their autonomy further threatened—when the state asserts the intent to protect them from trumped-up threats that are overstated and insignificant in comparison to a spate of other much more common material, even mortal, threats to their lives and well-being.
Antiabortion Forces Have a Blueprint to Ban Abortion Pills Nationwide (And You Thought Project 2025 Was Bad?)
Not satisfied with the overthrow of Roe v. Wade and Trump’s compliance with nearly all things Project 2025, right-wing conservatives are pushing the president to go further. In a chilling blueprint, “Stopping Pills that Kill,” antiabortion groups urge President Trump to stop the movement of domestic and international abortion pills using the Comstock Act of 1873 and a dragnet of new regulations.
The new scheme calls for every U.S. law enforcement entity to play a role—federal, state and city/county agencies. Starting at home, extremists urge Trump to compel federal prosecutors to charge providers of abortion pills weaponizing both the Comstock Act and racketeering statutes (RICO) for using the postal system. They would then add regulations governing the U.S. postmaster general and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service to list abortion pills as “nonmailable … hazardous materials or devices that may present an immediate threat to persons,” which would make shipping them a federal offense carrying civil and possibly criminal penalties.
Keeping Score: Trump’s Executive Orders Undo Progress; Meta Allows Hate Against Women and LGBTQ People; Abortion Ban States Are Losing Residents
In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.
This week: Trump enacts harmful executive actions on immigration, global abortion care, DEI and foreign assistance; Trump’s new treasury secretary said expanding tax cuts for the wealthy is “the single most important economic issue of the day”; Trump pardoned anti-abortion extremists; ICE raids spread fear; 1.4 percent of trans teens participate in sports, but 40 percent are bullied at school; Whole Woman’s Health has expanded its 24/7 abortion care services; states hostile to abortion rights see challenges attracting and retaining workers; female firefighters will now receive federal compensation for treatment for reproductive cancers; remembering Cecile Richards, and more.