Two years after the Supreme Court ended federal abortion protections, some Democratic-led states have taken steps to combat restrictive procedural laws that have been passed in Republican-led states.
Efforts in Democratic-led states include protective laws that prohibit patients and providers from facing the legal consequences of abortion procedures.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports reproductive rights, 14 states now have a virtual ban on abortion, forcing many women to travel out of state to undergo the procedure.
Nearly one in five patients traveled out of state for abortion care in the first half of 2023, compared to about one in 10 in 2020, according to data released in December by Guttmacher.
In April, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled that the near-total ban on abortion dating from 1864 could be strengthened. The move sparked major controversy and, last month, sparked Arizona’s Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs. signed into law a bipartisan bill to repeal this 160-year-old ban.
Amid uncertainty surrounding abortion access in Arizona, California Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom responded by signing a bill allowing Arizona doctors to temporarily provide abortion care to their patients. abortion in its neighboring state.
“Arizona Republicans attempted to go back in time to 1864 to impose a near-total ban on abortion across their state,” Newsom, a Biden campaign surrogate, said in a press release to the time. “We refuse to stand idly by and accept their oppressive and dangerous attacks on women.”
Illinois Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker signed a bill into law last year that regulates the use of license plate readers, providing protection to out-of-state abortion patients. The law prohibits the use of information obtained from a license plate reader to trace a person seeking an abortion.
During the first half of 2023, Illinois saw the largest increase in out-of-state patients seeking abortion care of any state, according to data from the Guttmacher Institute. During that period, it saw 18,870 out-of-state patients, more than triple what it saw during the same period in 2020.
In May 2022, just before Roe v. Wade was overturned, Connecticut Democratic Governor Ned Lamont signed a sweeping bill into law. who protects abortion providers and patients who come to Connecticut for abortion care are protected from legal action.
New Mexico and Maryland also have laws in place that protect abortion providers from out-of-state investigations.
Heather Williams, chairwoman of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, told CBS News that Republicans have “weaponized state legislatures to deny access to essential reproductive care” since the Dobbs decision.
“But for every Republican attempt to restrict access to abortion, state Democrats have put in place protections and opened the doors for out-of-state patients to receive care,” Williams said in a statement. “The DLCC and our candidates are implementing the Democrats’ national agenda at the state level, and progress in the states reflects the importance of this level of voting in ensuring these rights are protected.”
The Republican Legislative Campaign Committee did not respond to requests for comment.
Mini Timmaraju, president of the advocacy group Reproductive Freedom for All, said she was very grateful for what Democratic lawmakers have done so far, but acknowledged the efforts were not enough.
“It’s patchwork, isn’t it?” Timmaraju told CBS News. “We’re creating, like, band-aid solutions. And again, bless those blue state legislatures and governors, but the only real solution is to get a blue pro-reproductive freedom trio at the federal level, to make sure that we can codify federal abortion rights.
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