Photo: Gloria Rebecca Gomez/Arizona Mirror
The day before Hurricane Helene devastated Western North Carolina, I had the opportunity to join a group of elected officials from across the country, led by Georgia Rep. Nikema Williams, in Washington D.C. We gathered in front of the Capitol for a press conference where we each spoke about the critical importance of access to reproductive health care. The event concluded with Rep. Williams introducing a resolution recognizing abortion as a human right. It was a powerful and moving event, with women from all levels of elected office describing how the criminalization of reproductive care has affected their communities.
Earlier that week, ProPublica released shocking stories of two women in Georgia, Amber Thurman and Candi Miller, who both died as a direct result of Georgia’s restrictive abortion laws.
And recently, we learned the horrific story of the pregnant 18-year-old Texan who was turned away from multiple ERs and denied desperately needed care by providers who feared prosecution if they intervened in her pregnancy-related sepsis. Her mother was at her side when she died, helplessly begging doctors to save her daughter’s life. We also learned of Josseli Barnica — a young mother who also died after doctors delayed emergency care. She miscarried for 40 hours and was never offered care to help prevent the infection that ultimately took her life.
These latter two deaths happened in 2023 and 2021 respectively and are only being made public now. We can only guess how many more there have been and that number sadly will soar under a Trump-Vance administration, a Republican-controlled Congress, emboldened Republican-controlled state legislatures and an anti-rights movement committed to criminalizing abortion. In the near future, access to medication abortion through telehealth could end, as will federal protections for emergency medical care, including abortion services, in cases of obstetric emergencies. Maternal deaths in states with abortion bans and restrictions will likely increase rapidly in the first year of Trump’s presidency.
That’s why I am partnering with a national coalition of reproductive health, rights and justice organizations, led by Ipas, that is developing a new legal framework in support of reproductive healthcare, grounded in the reality that abortion is a human right to which everyone is entitled. Every level of government has a role to play in ensuring this access, especially in North Carolina, where we have seen an influx of “abortion refugees” seeking safe, legal abortion care as surrounding states have passed extreme restrictions, and in some cases, fully criminalized abortion.
Along with serving on the Town Council, I also volunteer as a Clinic Escort at our local Planned Parenthood. Of late, the parking lot is routinely filled with out-of-state license plates. We witness families, couples, and individuals who are making profound sacrifices to access care in our community, including driving all night, sleeping in their vehicles, and using their limited resources, which would otherwise go to rent and groceries, to get to North Carolina to receive essential health care.
It is abhorrent and heart-breaking to hear their stories. While we welcome all who need care to seek it in our community, clinics and abortion funds are overwhelmed by the demand. In some cases, it is still not enough. Amber Thurman was able to travel from Georgia to North Carolina for medication abortion, but Georgia’s criminalization of care still prevented her from accessing needed treatment of complications, resulting in her tragic death.
The UN Human Rights Committee called on all levels of government to take action to ensure no one is criminalized for a pregnancy outcome. In Chapel Hill, I was honored to bring forward a resolution, unanimously supported by my colleagues, asserting that reproductive rights and abortion are human rights. This is the path forward to ensure that no one is criminalized, that no one is turned away when they seek care, and that no one is forced to wait, putting their health and life at risk because doctors’ hands are tied due to abortion bans and restrictions.
In North Carolina, some of the election results were deeply frustrating, but there is reason for hope. While a majority of North Carolina voters supported Trump, we also elected pro-choice Democrats to key leadership positions that can increase access to sexual and reproductive health care in our state — Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General and more. The Republican supermajority in the state legislature may well also have been broken. While the next four years will be challenging, I believe there is much we can do in Chapel Hill and in other communities throughout North Carolina. One crucial step is to ground abortion in human rights and in work locally — community by community, city by city. We can and must do better for our communities, for our families, for all of us.
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