Texas Says Forcing Women to Go Out of State for Abortions Is Stimulating Commerce

[babylonsister]

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/09/ken-paxton-texas-abortion-law-stimulates-commerce

Levin Report
Texas Says Forcing Women to Go Out of State for Abortions Is Stimulating Commerce
According to Texas attorney general, the barbaric abortion law has been great for trade.
By Bess Levin
September 30, 2021


As states around the country roll back abortion rights, we’re hearing a lot of arguments explaining why forcing a person to carry a pregnancy against their will is actually a positive thing. In Mississippi, the attorney general claimed last week that overturning Roe v. Wade will “empower” women. In Texas, Governor Greg Abbott insisted that the state’s no-exceptions abortion law will not require rape victims to give birth to their attacker’s child because he’s going to “eliminate” all rapists, an argument reminiscent of the one made by a Missouri congressman in 2012, in which he declared, “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” All of them are ridiculous, all of them are insulting, and all of them engender the very specific response of, “What the f--k is wrong with you?” And speaking of which!

On Wednesday, Texas defended its Heartbeat Act by arguing—wait for it—that forcing pregnant people to travel hundreds of miles out of state to obtain a medical procedure that it has effectively banned is a good thing because it is “stimulating” interstate commerce. In a court filing, Attorney General Ken Paxton—the one who sued other states last year to overturn the 2020 election—said that contrary to the Justice Department’s claim that the federal government has the authority to block the law over interstate-commerce concerns, he’s seen news reports of women driving to Oklahoma and Kansas to seek abortions. Which, like a sociopath, he paints as a positive development. The DOJ doesn’t “cite any actual evidence that the Texas Heartbeat Act burdens interstate commerce,” Paxton said in the filing in federal court in Austin. “What evidence that does exist in the record suggests that, if anything, the Act is stimulating rather than obstructing interstate travel.” In other words, according to this guy, Oklahoma and Kansas and whatever other states people are fleeing to to end their pregnancies because they can’t do so locally owe Texas a debt of gratitude.

Not surprisingly, Paxton’s line of reasoning didn’t go over well with opponents of the law, which bans abortions at six weeks, a time before most people know they’re pregnant. “As thousands of pregnant Texans seeking essential, time-sensitive medical care are forced to flee the state in desperation, Texas is now claiming its blatantly unconstitutional abortion ban has ‘stimulated’ interstate travel,” ACLU staff attorney Julia Kaye said in a statement. “It is appalling that Texas is trying to capitalize on the catastrophe anti-abortion politicians created.”

Since Texas enacted the strictest abortion law in the U.S. this month, abortion providers are struggling to survive, with patients obtaining abortion pills through the mail, in addition to driving out of state. In court documents, an Oklahoma-based Planned Parenthood doctor drove one woman six hours alone, one way, because she was worried any companion could be sued under the absurd law that allows private citizens who “aid and abet” the procedure to be sued. According to Reuters, KT Volkova, a graduate student in central Texas was forced to take an abortion-inducing medication sent to them via mail after finding out they were nearly six weeks pregnant. “I would have preferred to have it in-clinic, with staff holding my hand, but I had to go through the entire process in my apartment alone,” Volkova said.

During a House Oversight Committee hearing on abortion on Thursday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez castigated an anti-abortion Texas ob-gyn who claimed that women who have been raped have tons of time to obtain an abortion under SB8. “Six weeks pregnant is two weeks late for one’s period,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “When you are raped, you don’t always know what happened to you. And I speak about this as a survivor. You are in so much shock.” The doctor, Ingrid Skop, insisted that “In the case of a rape, women generally know that they’ve been raped,” she said. Ocasio-Cortez responded that it was “unbelievable” that the Republican lawmakers on the committee would call a witness who would be so “irresponsible and hurtful to survivors across this country,” though, really, it’s actually entirely believable.

[qazplm135]

1. which means it's affecting interstate commerce

which brings it under federal purview.