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Action Plan for Abortion Justice

We are united in our vision: a world where abortion care is affordable, available, and supported for everyone who needs it. We know people of color working to make ends meet have been denied the promise of legal abortion for decades because of the Hyde Amendment and other abortion restrictions. Race, economic insecurity, and immigration status can multiply the already-massive barriers to abortion care. To achieve true abortion justice, our solutions must incorporate racial, economic, and immigrant justice.

The Action Plan for Abortion Justice consists of bold, proactive policy solutions to address the lived realities of abortion access. We urge local, state, and federal policymakers to advance comprehensive abortion justice policies with the following components.

✱ Abortion care is available without hurdles or stigma for people of color working to make ends meet, young folks, LGBTQ, and gender nonconforming people.

    • Reinforce a right to bodily autonomy in cities, states, and nationally where no state or federal law can supersede or interfere with that right.
    • Remove all restrictions on abortion care.
    • Create legal avenues for patients and providers to protect themselves against anti-abortion entities and protesters.
    • Protect providers, individuals who assist, and individuals who have abortions, especially individuals who self-manage their abortions, from criminalization.
    • Protect young people seeking abortion care by repealing parental consent and notification requirements.
    • Prohibit discrimination based on reproductive health care decisions or outcomes.

✱ Abortion care is available, affordable, and accessible for immigrants of any documentation status without fear of deportation, detention, or harm to their own or their family’s immigration process.

    • Protect people seeking abortion care from criminalization, regardless of their documentation status.
    • Remove law and immigration enforcement from medical and healthcare settings and ensure quality, seamless care for people in detention or custody.
    • Ensure people can safely travel for abortion care, regardless of documentation status.
    • Ensure that immigrants have insurance coverage and financial support to access abortion care.
    • Provide culturally competent and linguistically appropriate care.

✱ Abortion care is available in the communities where we live.

    • Invest in clinic and provider infrastructure at the local, state, and federal levels, including federally funded facilities.
    • Invest in the provision of abortion care, from licensure to insurance, so it remains free from political interference.
    • Remove all barriers to abortion care training and require all public universities and medical schools to provide training for physicians, registered nurses, nurse practitioners, nurse-midwives, physician assistants, and other advanced practice clinicians within their scope of practice.
    • Invest in pharmaceutical and technological research and innovation to improve quality of care, reduce cost, and increase access.
    • Make abortion care information readily available in multiple languages on government websites to ensure people are aware of their rights and resources, and can trust that the information is accurate.

✱ Abortion care, especially medication abortion and telehealth, is provided in ways that are comfortable, secure, and makes sense for patients.

    • Remove all regulatory and legislative barriers to mifepristone being available over the counter, including removing onerous provider certification processes.
    • Allow physicians, registered nurses, nurse practitioners, nurse-midwives, physician assistants, and other advanced practice clinicians to provide abortion care within their scope of practice.
    • Require public colleges and universities to provide medication abortion at their on-campus health centers at no cost.

✱ Abortion care is affordable and covered by all public and private health insurance plans.

    • End all bans on insurance coverage of abortion.
    • Require insurance providers to provide consumer-friendly information about covered services and cover abortion or abortion-related care among the full range of reproductive health care at no cost to the patient.
    • End all bans on public funding of abortion and provide federal grants to states and localities for abortion care and practical support funding streams.
    •  Ensure abortion providers, both in-clinic and via telehealth, can operate sustainably with equitable reimbursement rates.

Thank you to All* Above All partners–including abortion providers, abortion funds, state organizations, legal experts, economic and immigrant justice organizations, youth and faith organizations, and federal policy experts–for their thoughtful and bold contributions.

AAA_ActionPlan_AbortionJustice

New Polling Connecting Race, Immigration, and Abortion Justice

This memo summarizes key findings from an online national survey among 1,713 adults, including 501 Black, 507 Latinx, 402 AAPI, and 303 white base and persuasion adults. Adults who believe abortion should never be legal were screened out of the survey and are not included in the sample. The interviews were conducted from December 6 to 15, 2021. Qualitative research with the same audiences preceded the national survey.

Facts About Medication Abortion Care

Fact sheet on medication abortion care

New Polling: Striking Majority in Battleground Congressional Districts Supports Abortion Coverage (2021)

This memo summarizes key findings from an online survey among 801 registered voters in battleground congressional districts. The interviews were conducted from July 7 to 12, 2021. The sample is demographically and geographically representative of the electorate and is consistent with the political dispositions of voters in the 37 battleground districts.

Poll: Majority of Americans support Medicaid abortion coverage (2021)

A national poll conducted in March 2021 by Ipsos shows that 54% of Americans support Medicaid insurance covering abortion.  When provided more information, support increases to 56%, and nearly three in five Americans (58%) agree that all health insurance, both private and government-funded, should cover reproductive health care, including abortion.

EACH Act Fact Sheet

THE EQUAL ACCESS TO ABORTION COVERAGE

IN HEALTH INSURANCE (EACH) ACT:

Groundbreaking Legislation for Abortion Justice

The EACH Act is bold legislation to reverse the Hyde Amendment and related abortion coverage restrictions. The bill has been introduced by Representatives Barbara Lee (D-CA), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Diana DeGette (D-CO), and Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) in the U.S. House and Senators Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Patty Murray (D-WA), and Mazie Hirono (D-HI) in the U.S. Senate.

 LEGISLATIVE OVERVIEW

The EACH Act would have a significant impact on abortion care for people and families who are working to make ends meet, creating two important standards for reproductive health:

First, it sets up the federal government as a standard-bearer, ensuring that every person who receives care or insurance through the federal government will have coverage for abortion services. The EACH Act restores abortion coverage to those:

  • enrolled in a government health insurance plan (i.e., Medicaid, Medicare), including those who live in the District of Columbia;
  • enrolled in a government-managed health insurance program (i.e., FEHBP, TRICARE) due to an employment relationship; or
  • receiving health care from a government provider or program (i.e., Indian Health Services, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, the Veterans Administration).

Second, it prohibits political interference with decisions by private health insurance companies to offer coverage for abortion care. The federal government cannot interfere with the private insurance market, including the insurance marketplaces established by the Affordable Care Act, to prevent insurance companies from providing abortion coverage.

 CURRENT RESTRICTIONS

Since the Hyde Amendment was passed in 1976, anti-abortion federal politicians have added abortion coverage and funding bans to programs affecting:

  • Medicaid, Medicare and Children’s Health Insurance Program enrollees;
  • Federal employees and their dependents;
  • Peace Corps volunteers;
  • Native Americans and Indigenous peoples who get their care through Indian Health Services;
  • People in federal prisons and detention centers, including those detained for immigration purposes;
  • Military members, veterans and their dependents; and
  • Low-income people in the District of Columbia.

Currently, 34 states and the District of Columbia do not cover abortion within their state Medicaid programs, except for limited exceptions. Additionally, anti-abortion politicians in 26 states have enacted restrictions that interfere with abortion as a covered health service in health plans offered by health insurance exchanges, 22 states restrict abortion coverage in insurance plans available for public employees, and 11 states have laws restricting insurance coverage of abortion in all private insurance plans written in the state.

 THE IMPACT OF ABORTION COVERAGE BANS

When policymakers deny people insurance coverage for abortion, they either are forced to carry the pregnancy to term or pay for care out of their own pockets. Consequently, cutting off access to or placing strict limitations on abortion can have profoundly harmful effects on public health, particularly for those who already face significant barriers to receiving quality care, such as people working to make ends meet, immigrants, young people, and women of color.

  • Fifty-five (55%) of reproductive-age women enrolled in Medicaid live in states that withhold insurance coverage for abortion except in limited circumstances.
  • Fifty-one percent (51%) of reproductive-age women who are enrolled in Medicaid and subject to abortion coverage restrictions are women of color.
  • Studies show that when policymakers place severe restrictions on Medicaid coverage of abortion, it forces one in four poor women seeking an abortion to carry an unwanted pregnancy to ter
  • When a someone is living paycheck to paycheck, denying coverage for an abortion can push them deeper into poverty. Indeed, studies show that a woman who seeks an abortion but is denied is more likely to fall into poverty than one who is able to get an abortion.
  • Women with lower socioeconomic status – specifically those who are least able to afford out-of-pocket medical expenses – already experience disproportionately high rates of adverse health conditions. Denying access to abortion care only exacerbates existing health disparities.
  • In some cases, women need to delay their abortions to take time to raise funds for the procedure. According to the Federal Reserve Board, 40% of Americans do not have enough savings to pay for a $400 emergency expense like an abortion.
  • Due to inequities in health care and systemic racism, women of color are more likely to qualify for government insurance programs that restrict abortion coverage and are more likely to experience higher rates of unintended pregnancy.

First 100 Days Agenda for Abortion Justice

Policy recommendations for the Biden-Harris Administration to enact in its first 100 days.

Biden Cabinet Appointment Letter

FY22 Clean Budget Letter