Two years ago today

Jessica Valenti holds out hope two years after the overruling of Roe v. Wade:

I’m not telling you this story to sugarcoat the nightmare of the last two years—there’s no getting around how awful it’s been or how many people have been harmed. But it’s precisely because this moment is so difficult that we need to focus on how powerful we really are. 

Here’s something I told the amazing Wyoming activists I met this weekend: We are the majority. America supports abortion and has for decades. Most incredibly, it turns out that even polls showing that majority are likely undercounting just how strong support for abortion rights really is. 

We didn’t need a poll to tell us that, though. We see how much people care about this issue any time there’s an election—whether abortion is directly on the ballot or folks are voting for their next state Supreme Court justice. 

That’s why anti-abortion politicians and lobbyists are running scared. They’ve gone from pretending they have the moral high ground to (falsely) promising that they’re softening on the issue. Anti-abortion messaging is suddenly hyper-focused on so-called exceptions, ‘compassion’ and ‘consensus.’ They won’t even use the word ‘ban’ anymore.

Republicans are scrubbing their campaign websites of any mention of abortion, doing an about-face on their public support for a national ban, and toying with losing the moniker ‘pro-life’ altogether. Conservative lawmakers and activists are so aware Americans support abortion that they’re launching ballot measures of their own—amendments with pro-choice-sounding names meant to trick people into voting for restrictions. 

All of which is to say: they know that they’re losing. And we’re winning. Not every day, and not enough to stop all the harm bans have caused—but our power has never been clearer. I’m not just talking about elections and polls, though we’re winning those too!

The reason 8,000 people a month are getting abortion medication despite living in states with bans is because there are rooms full of doctors and activists shoving pills into envelopes. The fact that 171,000 women last year had to travel out-of-state for abortion is awful, but it also means that abortion funds helped them get the care they needed. 

The anti-aboriton lobby never gave up after countless setbacks, and in that way and that way only proponents of reproductive freedom and equality need to emulate them.