Washington, D.C. — In Project 2025, an authoritarian playbook from the Heritage Foundation, far-right extremists have outlined a plan to curtail the decision-making power of pregnant patients and medical providers in a calculated effort to exert total control over reproductive freedom in America.
A new Center for American Progress column explains the far-reaching consequences of misapplying the Comstock Act to eliminate access to medication abortion access through the mail for women and families.
Far-right extremists have set their sights on upending independent agencies such as the U.S. Department of Justice and Food and Drug Administration to eradicate abortion access. If they succeed, the far-reaching consequences will be detrimental to women, families, and providers and further fuel the politicization of medicine in the United States:
- More women will die. Without a mail option for medication abortion, the steep logistical and financial burdens of traveling for abortion access will exacerbate the maternal mortality and morbidity crisis in the United States, particularly for women of color.
- Fearing criminalization, providers will be forced to deny care to patients. An even broader array of medical providers will be in the untenable position of providing care or facing potential jail time, which will lead to delay—if not outright denial— of maternity care.
- Maternity care deserts will proliferate. The criminalization of medical providers will lead to an even greater shortage of maternity care professionals and resources, eradicating access to basic and vital maternity care for families and communities.
- Politics—not science—will regulate drug safety determinations. By weakening the independence of the FDA for their personal ideology, far-right extremists will fuel the politicization of medicine to the detriment of the well-being of every patient in America.
“The Project 2025 plan for Comstock makes it clear that far-right extremists are willing to override and bypass the democratic norms of checks and balances to achieve their goal of a national abortion ban by any means necessary, at the expense of the health and lives of every patient in America,” said Sabrina Talukder, director of the Women’s Initiative at CAP and author of the column. “Rolling back access to medication abortion would worsen preexisting health care disparities and create insurmountable barriers to care, especially for marginalized women of color.”
Read the column: “The Sweeping Consequences of the Far Right’s Plan To Effectuate a Backdoor National Abortion Ban in Project 2025” by Sabrina Talukder
For more information or to speak with an expert, please contact Sarah Nadeau at [email protected].