Texas Woman Denied Departure from State to Have Abortion
But what if she somehow ends it, will she not be arrested for murder?
Dear reader, please forgive me for the sensationalist headline. The Texas Supreme Court has denied Kate Cox, 31, of Texas, from getting an emergency pregnancy because, being the qualified physicians they are, they determined that the pregnancy does not risk Kate’s life.
The court did admit that Kate’s pregnancy has been one chock full of complications. It was also learned that the fetus was diagnosed with trisomy 18, otherwise known as Edward’s disease. This is a chromosomal condition, and while there have been a handful of cases where babies live to their twenties, the majority have short lives filled with suffering. Kate and her partner decided to end the pregnancy due to all of the complications and the possibility that it could harm her and her future chances of having another baby.
In its opinion, released Monday night, the Texas Supreme Court acknowledged that Cox’s pregnancy “has been extremely complicated” and “parents would be devastated to learn of their unborn child’s trisomy 18 diagnosis.” In its opinion, though, the judges wrote that “[s]ome difficulties in pregnancy, however, even serious ones, do not pose the heightened risks to the mother the exception encompasses. The exception requires a doctor to decide whether Ms. Cox’s difficulties pose such risks. [Cox’s doctor] asked a court to pre-authorize the abortion yet she could not, or at least did not, attest to the court that Ms. Cox’s condition poses the risks the exception requires (Texas Supreme Court Rules Against Woman).”
In Texas, Kate is forbidden from having an abortion. She sued and was granted that right by a lower court. The Texas Supreme Court stepped in and denied her this right. Kate plans to leave the state to take care of her medical condition. On her way out, she also plans to drive by the Texas Supreme Court building and flip them off while her husband shines them a moon. Good for them, right?
Actually, I don’t know anything about Kate’s route for leaving the state, but it would be totally within her right to flip off anyone she so wishes in Texas. By now, though, you might have picked up on the deceit in my article’s title: “Texas Woman Denied Departure from State to Have Abortion”
The Texas Supreme Court has not denied her right to leave the state. They can’t, but the question I want to ask is when they will prevent her from leaving. When does this anti-abortion/fascist lunacy reach the point when someone like Kate Cox is arrested for a crime she hasn’t committed yet, like in the Tom Cruise movie Minority Report? Kate has not concealed her desire to go to another state and end her pregnancy. If I understand it correctly, in Texas, if Kate ends her pregnancy, then she could be arrested.
If I say that I am going to another state to rob a bank and then do it, I will be arrested when I return to Texas, right? When Kate returns to Texas voided of her pregnancy, can she not be sued by the state for having ended the life of her baby? I am genuinely confused, and I am genuinely afraid of what will become standard practice in our country if the Christian fascists are not stopped.
What if Kate doesn’t leave the state and somehow manages to end her pregnancy?
In a future Texas and other similar off-the-rails states, once women like Kate have expressed a desire to end their pregnancies, will there be “holding pens” overseen by midwives whose task will be to enforce the completion of their pregnancies? Imagine a ward-like setting with relaxing music piped in and rows of beds containing heavily sedated women in varying degrees of pregnancy. The baby emerges and is instantly removed from a loving, Christian family. The mother is moved to another ward and, within 24 hours, escorted out of the facility.
Imagine a pregnant woman driving toward a state’s border, and just as she approaches, alarm bells go off. The border is closed, and her vehicle is guided to a nearby lot. She is checked for her “pregnancy papers.” It is learned that she is a “reliable breeder” and is permitted to pass. The bus off the side slowly fills with the unreliable ones. She looks over with disgust at those women and off she drives to Tulsa.
If you think I am exaggerating or that none of this is possible, let me remind you of one date in our nation’s recent history: January 6th.