The women’s and reproductive health landscape is about to get very unpredictable. No doubt, between last week’s record showing of statehouses turned blue and an overwhelmingly Democratic 120th Congress, we will shake up the status quo in all kinds of welcome ways. But the road ahead is hardly linear.
There remain many federal hurdles. Although the Trump administration largely avoided taking decisive action on abortion for the past two years, angering the base by punting litigation and federal agency action until after the midterms, there are signals this may change quickly. Last weekend, the Justice Department petitioned to intervene in a longstanding Texas lawsuit against Planned Parenthood over Medicaid reimbursements, proactively taking ownership of a case that it likely assumes the state will abandon. Never forget that Todd Blanche was caught boasting that his goal as U.S. attorney general is to make Dobbs “permanent in every single state.” Beyond DOJ, the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission has signaled it intends to roll back workplace protections for pregnant women afforded by the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, and the FDA, which possesses outsized capacity to curtail and potentially eliminate access to mifepristone, will soon issue its so-called “safety” report, now due in March.
Ready for another utterly alarming reality? As chaos continues to reign at Health and Human Services, and Congress may or may not impeach or investigate Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., there is a newly created position that could influence women’s health. Two weeks before Election Day, President Trump issued an executive order, Advancing Women’s Health to Improve Outcomes in All Phases of Life, that created a White House task force and a National Institutes of Health division to focus on conditions that uniquely or disproportionately affect women, including menopause, cardiovascular disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, osteoporosis, fibroids, endometriosis, and infertility, among others. (I was invited to attend the signing ceremony and declined, and instead analyzed the EO for The Contrarian, CNN, and Oprah Daily.) As per the EO, the designated co-chair of the task force is the White House chief of staff, a role seemingly hand-picked for Susie Wiles. Now that she has been sent packing, Stephen Miller is apparently at the helm of it. Holy dystopia. Do not look away. The danger is real. (And, as far as I can tell, mainstream media is completely unaware of this detail buried in the executive order.)
It is true that in addition to Congress, blue states possess a few distinct ways to block or destabilize some federal advances. As ever, look to Texas (Blue Texas!) for the dizzying array of variables. It is one of several states that has sued the Food and Drug Administration to curb mifepristone, arguing (implausibly) that the agency failed to thoroughly evaluate the drug’s safety and effectiveness. Now, the newly elected state attorney general, Nathan Johnson, has the power to assess whether to pursue lawsuits brought under Ken Paxton’s tenure. Less than 24 hours after Election Day, Johnson announced he would not continue Paxton’s legal attacks on out-of-state clinicians protected by shield laws for prescribing mifepristone to women in Texas. And Johnson has the opportunity to cease defending the state’s near-total abortion ban — vis-à-vis the lawsuit brought by the family of a Texas woman who died after doctors refused to perform an abortion when she was suffering from an urgent pregnancy-related health condition.
That is a pretty extraordinary array of real-time interventions. Of course, numerous other states with fresh composition are poised to do similar. Attorneys general also flipped blue in Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, and Kansas; together with Democratic governors-elect in Georgia, Ohio, and Texas, in particular, and in many other states now led by Democratic trifectas and women in key roles, the momentum is real for a new generation of abortion approaches and laws.
As someone whose advocacy entails navigating in odd and in-between places, I share these ideas as a reminder that we all must stay in the habit of threading needles that may get lost in the big headlines. As for me, I will continue to keep watch on all of the above — especially that RFK, Jr. and Miller-led task force — and report back here. I ask Contrarian readers to do the same, especially those of you in states where change is now possible. We still need to be mindful of those tiny details that may go unnoticed — and that we can mobilize around.
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Meanwhile, pundits continue to unpack all that transpired last week and what it means going forward. I want to share exit polling from Reproductive Freedom for All and Impact Research, which found that a majority (53 percent) of battleground voters said abortion rights influenced their vote; a majority also expressed that the new Democratic Congress should strengthen protections for reproductive health care. According to the polling, voters saw health care and abortion as economic issues in a year in which affordability dominated political discussion.
This is such an important takeaway. Too often, women’s health is treated by candidates and politicians and media as a niche concern, secondary to “kitchen table” issues or, worse, not inextricably linked to the tenets of democracy. The Contrarian has pounded this drum from the start — certainly throughout the election — and will continue to do so now that the Democrats have a fighting chance to set an agenda to fulfill voters’ demands. I’ll say it again, loud and clear: Every aspect of women’s health belongs in and at the top of their point-by-point plans.
Jennifer Weiss-Wolf is executive director of the Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Center at NYU School of Law. She also leads strategy and partnerships at Ms. Magazine.
