Mandatory Adoption Seminars: The Latest Anti-Abortion Scheme

Anti-abortion activists across the nation are promising an onslaught of bills next year, and they have a new ploy.

Tony Gutierrez/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Texas lawmakers have already walloped abortion access with 24-hour mandatory waiting periods and onerous rules that shut down almost half of the state’s clinics. But one anti-abortion lawmaker is gearing up for more. Although the legislature isn’t in session this year, state Sen. Ed Lucio (D) is promising to introduce a bill for 2015 that would force women to undergo an hour-long adoption seminar before obtaining an abortion.

Lucio declined through a spokesman to be interviewed for this article. But a similar bill he offered in 2013 provides clues about the forthcoming legislation. That bill instructed the Texas Health and Human Services Commission to create an educational course about adoption of up to three hours. Women would have to take the course, for free, online or in person, and submit a “certificate of completion” to the physician performing the abortion. The bill contained an exception for women who have become pregnant as the result of rape or incest or who required an abortion for medical reasons.

“It is my hope that, when presented with more information on adoption resources and services available, more pregnancies can be carried to term,” Lucio told the San Antonio Express-News a year ago.

Lucio isn’t the only anti-abortion legislator with his sight set on 2015. In terms of abortion politics, 2014 has been relatively quiet, especially compared with 2011 and 2013—two recordbreaking years for the number of anti-abortion bills introduced in state legislatures. That’s largely because some state legislatures that produce a steady stream of anti-abortion legislation haven’t been in session, says Elizabeth Nash, the state issues manager for the pro-abortion rights Guttmacher Institute. In 2015, Nash says, Texas and North Dakota lawmakers go back to work, and there will be no federal elections competing for attention—meaning the number of anti-abortion bills will likely rise again.

In fact, the only reason Lucio’s original bill didn’t pass in 2013 may be that he introduced it in the waning days of a special session that Gov. Rick Perry (R) convened to pass another anti-abortion bill. That one required abortion providers to have admitting privileges with a local hospital. Despite Sen. Wendy Davis (D)’s infamous filibuster, that law passed. Lucio can file a new bill on or after November 10 for consideration next year.

In Ohio, the state’s Right to Life President Mike Gonidakis has promised a “rather large and robust” slate of anti-abortion laws next year. Without providing details, Gonidakis told the Columbus Dispatch that his group is prepared to supply five or six bills to anti-abortion lawmakers. In Iowa, lawmakers next year are expected to consider a bill that bans physicians from giving instructions on abortion-inducing drugs by webcam or phone.

Iowa has more than a dozen clinics that provide “telemedicine” abortions—procedures in which patients use medication at home and receive advice on how to do so from supervising doctors via phone calls or video chats. In ten states where lawmakers have passed similar bans since 2011, telemedicine abortions were already illegal, thanks to other anti-abortion laws. Perhaps it’s a sign: 2015 could turn out to be another blockbuster year for anti-abortion laws—but abortion foes might be running out of things to ban.

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate