Texas’ new abortion law just took effect. Here’s what it does — and what you need to know.
By Orion Rummler
The 19th
Texas’ law effectively banning abortions after six weeks of pregnancy took effect at midnight September 1. Lawsuits are pending, but for now, clinics must comply with the ban. Whole Woman’s Health, one abortion provider in the state that was named by providers in the joint plea to the Supreme Court to block the law, was still providing abortions within minutes before midnight, CEO Amy Hagstrom Miller told reporters on Wednesday.
Texas abortion restriction is disgusting, offensive
By Rep. Anna Eskamani
Orlando Sentinel
I woke up Thursday morning in horror — not only did Texas ban abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, but the Supreme Court of the United States was doing absolutely nothing to stop them.
Texas enforces restrictive abortion ban; FL advocates say it’s ‘part of a national agenda’
By Issac Morgan
Florida Phoenix
“The new Texas ban makes abortion everyone’s business but your own,” Laura Goodhue, executive director of the Florida Alliance of Planned Parenthood Affiliates, said in an email to the Florida Phoenix. “This unconstitutional law bans abortion at six weeks — before many people even know they’re pregnant — and it means that many Texas patients simply won’t be able to get an abortion. No one’s most personal medical decisions should be controlled by politicians or anyone else.”
Florida Legislature will consider abortion ‘heartbeat bill,’ Senate president says
By Kirby Wilson
Tampa Bay Times
When asked for comment about potential new abortion restrictions, Wilton Simpson sent a reporter the smiling sunglasses emoji.
State lawmaker wants Florida to impose Texas abortion limits
By Anthony Man
South Florida Sun Sentinel
State Rep. Anthony Sabatini said Wednesday he would introduce legislation that would duplicate Texas’ strict new anti-abortion law in Florida. It would ban most abortions. He and other anti-abortion lawmakers have repeatedly tried and failed to do the same thing before. The measure keeps getting killed in the Republican-controlled Florida Legislature.
Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh Did It—They Gutted ‘Roe v. Wade’
By Jessica Mason Pieklo
Rewire
The Supreme Court let the most restrictive abortion ban in the country—Texas SB 8, which bans abortion at about six weeks’ gestation—take effect without a single court hearing arguments on its constitutionality. This is bad. I cannot stress just how bad this is.
What Can Democrats Do to Fight Texas’s Abortion Ban? Lots.
By Elie Mystal
The Nation
No matter what fresh lawlessness Republicans commit, or what their legal enablers on the Supreme Court do to support that agenda, you can count on some Democrat or liberal-adjacent person saying, “But what can the Democrats do?” Never mind that Democrats control both chambers of Congress and the entire Executive Branch. They walk around every day like a defeated minority unable to stop Republicans—who lost—from having their way with our country.
As Texas’ abortion ban goes into effect, Instagram and Facebook block hashtags for ‘abortion pills’
By Claire Goforth
Daily Dot
As a sweeping abortion ban went into effect in Texas today, people realized that Instagram and Facebook were hiding searches for the abortion pill. Activists believe that the move is related to the law.
Texas Senate Bill 8: What it Means and How We Got Here
NARAL Pro-Choice America
The anti-choice movement, a major component of a larger conservative extremist movement
called the Radical Right, has waged a multi-decade campaign to end the legal right to abortion. This dystopian law in Texas is the latest development in their longstanding efforts to impose their regressive agenda and block social progress by any means necessary.
Texans Now Have A Lucrative Incentive To Sue Abortion Providers
By Zoe Tillman and Paul McLeod
BuzzFeed
Texas’s new 6-week abortion ban provides a lucrative and risk-free financial incentive for any private citizen to haul doctors, abortion rights advocates, and anyone else suspected of helping people get access to abortion into court.
The Texas abortion ban depends on menstruation ignorance
By Jeva Lange
The Week
Defend reproductive rights by talking openly about periods
One Texas Woman Describes Her Abortion Hours Before the State’s Six-Week Ban Went Into Effect
By Marie Solis
Jezebel
Jen*, a 21-year-old, got an abortion at eight weeks on Tuesday, hours before SB 8 went into effect
67 abortions in 17 hours: Inside a Texas clinic’s race to beat new six-week abortion ban
By Chabeli Carrazana
The 19th
At Whole Woman’s Health in Fort Worth, it was a race to perform as many abortions as possible until midnight, when a new Texas ban on the procedure became law.
“The Texas Abortion Ban Is in Effect, But We Haven’t Stopped” – The Lilith Fund, Texas
As told to Andrea González-Ramírez
New York Magazine
Shae Ward is the hotline director at the Lilith Fund for Reproductive Equity, the oldest abortion fund in the state. She spoke with the Cut about the devastating impact the ban is having on Texans seeking abortion care and how people can offer their support right now.
Birth at jail, death of baby show need for criminal justice reforms
Editorial
The Gainesville Sun
While serving as a Florida state representative, Clovis Watson Jr. joined his fellow lawmakers in unanimously approving the Tammy Jackson Act in 2020. Named after a woman who gave birth in a Broward County jail cell, the law was meant to prevent such circumstances from happening again. Watson was elected Alachua County sheriff last fall and now faces a tragically similar situation that happened in the Alachua County Jail, which the sheriff’s office runs.