Texas abortion foes use legal threats, propose laws to increase pressure on providers, allies [View all]

Texas anti-abortion conservatives are intensifying their efforts to shut down access for residents seeking abortions, with a near-daily drumbeat of threats and court filings aimed at donors, employers and others trying to help those patients.

They are part of a broad campaign by the anti-abortion rights movement, in the days since the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the constitutional right to abortion last month, to dry up avenues of assistance for Texans who have no access to abortion under several state laws and punish providers who have tried to legally continue offering services in a constantly changing legal landscape.

In their crosshairs are not just providers, but also nonprofit funding groups and the donors who support them; people who volunteer time or give money to abortion providers; employers who support pregnant workers in getting abortions, and the abortion clinics and employees themselves.

“Any person who was complicit in these illegal abortions—including [provider] Whole Woman’s Health employees, volunteers, and donors, and anyone who aided or abetted these illegal abortions in any manner, apart from the formerly pregnant woman upon whom the illegal abortion was performed — is equally liable under the Texas Heartbeat Act and equally guilty of murder,” reads a recent court filing by attorney Jonathan Mitchell, the legal architect of many of those efforts, including Senate Bill 8, a Texas law that bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected by allowing citizens to sue suspected violators.

Read more: https://www.caller.com/story/news/2022/07/19/texas-abortion-foes-use-legal-threats-propose-laws-to-raise-pressure/65376394007/
(Corpus Christi Caller-Times)