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Welcome to the latest edition of our weekly roundup. Every Monday, we’ll send you a summary of the biggest stories about bodily autonomy. We’ll also include links to pieces that Garnet or Susan have published.
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Let’s dive in.
On Autonomy News
Garnet broke the news that nearly $9 million in grants related to the Title X family planning program will go to groups with anti-abortion ties. One of the organizations, which will receive nearly $4.3 million, has never handled more than $50,000 in a single year. The other, which will receive $4.5 million, has appeared in our coverage before. It’s linked to the Heritage Foundation and one of the anti-abortion physician groups whose lawsuit started the current legal wrangling over mifepristone. (Share this story on Instagram, Bluesky, or TikTok.)
Garnet Henderson
Federal news
The Trump administration provided a court-ordered update on the status of a Food and Drug Administration “review” of the abortion drug mifepristone, and the update is that it won’t be complete until early 2027. Yes, after the midterm elections. A federal judge ordered the update in an ongoing lawsuit that Louisiana filed against the FDA, which seeks to end telehealth prescriptions of mifepristone nationwide. In response to that case and other conservative pressure, the FDA launched a bogus safety “review” in June. Justice Department lawyers said in last week’s filing that the FDA should have results by mid-December and will evaluate the data and draft a report “not later than March 2027.” Some abortion opponents are acting mad about this timeline, while others begrudgingly accept that restricting access before a midterm election would be disastrous for Republicans. One big thing worth flagging: The Trump administration referenced its authority to suspend FDA approval of mifepristone altogether “if confronted with concerning information during its review.” That’s buried in a footnote, but the government previously outlined this power in a March filing to the court.
Here’s an eyebrow-raising update in a lawsuit that an abortion provider filed against the FDA: The plaintiff, Whole Woman's Health Alliance, got internal emails suggesting coordination between the agency and the White House on abortion pills. Recall that a Virginia judge ordered the FDA in July to reconsider mifepristone regulations for being too restrictive. Whole Woman's then asked the judge to retain jurisdiction over the case until the agency completes its review—a request that the government opposed. The abortion provider cited "the very real possibility of political interference" in the agency’s decisionmaking and, in a new filing, they pulled out some receipts. In emails obtained via FOIA request, anonymous White House staffers made edits to a letter that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sent to Republican Attorneys General who sought crackdown on abortion pills. The RFK letter claimed that the Biden administration gave a “lack of adequate consideration” to the safety risks of allowing mifepristone prescriptions via telehealth. Louisiana referenced that exact language in its lawsuit against the FDA, and the judge cited it as a reason the state would win the case.
Babe, wake up, new fake paper on abortion dropped! Groups that want the FDA to force people to travel to clinics to get abortion pills are rallying behind a “peer-reviewed article” claiming that the agency lacked the required evidence to allow telehealth prescriptions of mifepristone. But this paper appears in a notorious journal run by an anti-abortion organization called the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, the coalition of physician groups that tried and failed to force the FDA take mifepristone off the market in a 2022 lawsuit. It’s the same journal that published a bogus “study” claiming mifepristone is in the drinking water of three U.S. cities. One of the co-authors is Dr. Ingrid Skop, an anti-abortion activist who said in a Congressional hearing that 9-year-olds can safely give birth.
Legal experts are skeptical that the Supreme Court will take yet another case related to abortion pills, which three Republican-led states want it to hear before any lower courts weigh in. Late last month, Louisiana, Alabama, and Arkansas asked the high court to immediately hear a challenge to telehealth “shield” laws in New York, Massachusetts, and California that protect clinicians who write medication abortion prescriptions across state lines. The Supreme Court can do this in disputes between states, but it’s not common. Abortion opponents paint shield laws as having created “a constitutional crisis.” But a constitutional law professor told Bloomberg Law that the Supreme Court could decline to take the case for the “very obvious” reason that the plaintiff states simultaneously filed a different challenge to shield laws in a lower federal court against nearly 30 pill providers. Another legal scholar agreed, writing that it’s unlikely the high court will take the shield law challenge until a state Supreme Court has weighed in.
A new report finds that 52 hospitals have closed their labor and delivery wards since the GOP’s big, ugly bill passed last July. Eight more have announced that they will close in anticipation of the Medicaid cuts that will kick in in the New Year.
Creepy and gross: The Federal Transit Administration released a proposed rule that would prioritize communities with higher marriage and birth rates for transit infrastructure funding. This is in line with a Department of Transportation memo that was released in the first few weeks of Trump’s second term.
The Trump administration’s recent settlement in a case called Texas v. Kennedy invalidated longstanding federal guidance about what it means for disabled people to live in a community—which had protected their right to live independent lives and not be institutionalized. Here’s what could change now.
Extremism
Trump’s new White House Press Secretary, Katie Zacharia, starts today. MAGA commentators are touting her “abortion survivor” narrative, claiming that a Christian counselor intervened at the last moment to stop her mom from having an abortion. But it gets worse: Zacharia served on the board of advisors for the extremist abortion “abolitionist” organization White Rose Resistance—which wants to prosecute people who have abortions for homicide—from November 2023 to February 2026. She also claimed in an interview that “the abortion pill has the same chemicals that they used… in Nazi Germany,” which is not true. Most recently, Zacharia worked as a senior communications advisor for Trump Media and Technology Group and Truth Social, because of course she did. She was also previously a commentator for Newsmax and Fox News.
Danish researchers voted to proceed with a deeply unethical study touted by RFK Jr that will withhold hepatitis B vaccines from newborns in the West African country of Guinea-Bissau, which has some of the highest hepatitis B rates in the world. The Guardian previously reported that the trial was suspended but it’s now moving forward, and with $1.6 million in funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The plan is to enroll 14,000 infants and give half the birth vaccine dose, while withholding the vaccine from the other half for six weeks and literally seeing what happens to them. One infectious disease expert told the Guardian that RFK “wants to make it so we don’t use a birth dose here in this country.”
State news
The Utah Supreme Court heard arguments over the constitutionality of a new law that allows the Attorney General to transfer cases challenging state statutes to a special three-judge panel rather than the full high court. The state legislature created the system in an attempt to produce more favorable outcomes in several key cases, including a challenge to the state’s total abortion ban. A lower court blocked the ban in 2022 and the Supreme Court denied the state’s appeal in 2024, so earlier this year, lawmakers added two seats to the court and created the new panel. AG Derek Brown quickly tried to transfer the abortion ban case to the three-judge panel and Planned Parenthood Association of Utah sued, arguing that the panel itself is unconstitutional. A trial over the ban that was scheduled for April was canceled. PPAU attorney Camila Vega told the justices, “after four years of litigation and sitting inches from the finish line, PPAU’s case has been disrupted by legislation threatening to overhaul the structure of Utah’s judiciary.” The justices gave no indication of when they might rule.
Maryland’s law requiring hospitals to provide abortion care when necessary to protect the health or life of a pregnant patient is in effect as of this month. The law is meant to restore the protections previously offered by the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), after the Trump administration invalidated longstanding interpretation of the law and refused to defend it in court.
A Pennsylvania bill—which was introduced by a Democrat—would make it a crime for “lay midwives” to administer prescription medications. This would include misoprostol, which is used to treat postpartum hemorrhage, the leading cause of pregnancy-related death. One OGBYN says that, while she understands concerns about the qualifications of unlicensed midwives, the fact is that people are seeking care from them. This is especially true in rural areas, where there are few or no other options. These providers should be allowed to carry lifesaving medications, she argues—just like any bystander could administer first aid in a situation where someone is dying.
Advocates in Texas believe that the state maternal mortality report—which was supposed to be released September 1, and is now expected December 1—was delayed because of the midterm elections. This means voters are heading to the polls without a full understanding of what they should expect from lawmakers heading into the 2027 legislative session, which starts in January. The delay will also make it harder for lawmakers to introduce bills to help alleviate the healthcare crisis.
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Elections
The Mormon Church has donated $1 million to the political action committee opposing Proposition 1, the abortion rights ballot measure in Idaho that would invalidate the state’s total ban. This comes after Attorney General Raúl Labrador declared that churches are allowed to donate to political campaigns, and after the church directed clergy to read anti-Prop 1 statements in two consecutive Sunday services.
Wisconsin Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Crowley committed to supporting a constitutional amendment that would protect reproductive rights. Abortion is legal in the state until 22 weeks after its Supreme Court struck down a 19th-century abortion ban last year, but many restrictions remain—including the gestational ban.
The influential anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America outlined an $8 million turnout campaign in "key races." Alongside more typical battlegrounds, they list the recently ruby-red states of Iowa, South Carolina, and Texas. The group also said it would spend $1.35 million in Iowa alone, which has competitive races for Senate and Governor. Sounds like they’re pretty scared about Josh Turek and Rob Sand, respectively!
Annie Andrews, the Democratic nominee for Senate in South Carolina, is doubling down on stigmatizing transgender people as she seeks to defeat Lindsay Graham’s sister, Darlene. After Donald Trump called her a transgender slur, Andrews released an ad saying she doesn’t support “biological men” playing women’s sports or gender-affirming surgery for minors. Andrews’ campaign also said she’s not working to change the state’s criminal bans on hormone treatment.
Meanwhile in the Palmetto State’s gubernatorial race, both the Democratic and Republican nominees said they wouldn’t seek to make abortion laws even more restrictive. Abortion is currently banned after about six weeks of pregnancy, and it doesn’t seem wise to trust that a Republican would veto a total ban if the legislature passed one. South Carolina lawmakers even considered two such bills in the past year, though neither advanced.
Planned Parenthood’s electoral arm is investing an additional $1 million in ads to support the Democrats running for Senate in Maine and Michigan, former state Senate president Troy Jackson and public health official Dr. Abdul El-Sayed.
A recent paper found that while abortion ballot measures helped Democrats in the 2022 midterms months after the fall of Roe v. Wade, similar initiatives in 2024 aided Republicans during a presidential year by effectively letting them split their votes. “In 2024, moderate voters who would have otherwise voted for Democratic candidates to protect abortion rights instead voted to protect abortion rights on the ballot measure while also voting for Republican candidates to align with their other policy preferences,” the authors wrote. The paper was mentioned in a story in the New Republic about measures on the ballot this fall in four states: Idaho, Missouri, Nevada, Virginia.
Assaults on queer people
Christian nationalist law firm Alliance Defending Freedom is taking an anti-trans case to the Supreme Court via its “shadow docket”—also known as the emergency docket—where cases get faster review than normal appeals. A high school athlete in Washington state claims that the state’s policy of allowing transgender athletes to participate in school sports violates Title IX, which prohibits gender discrimination in education. She alleges that a trans athlete touched her inappropriately during a wrestling match, and that she will be irreparably harmed if trans athletes are allowed to participate in the current athletic season. This is an example of the far-right using its anti-abortion playbook to attack trans people: First, they got the Supreme Court to approve trans sports bans in conservative states. Now, they’re attacking the states that protect trans athletes. The request will be reviewed by Justice Elena Kagan, who could rule at any time, but may also refer the issue to the full Court for consideration.
Relatedly, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals judge James Ho, one of the biggest far-right weirdos on the federal bench, wrote in an opinion that the Supreme Court should have misgendered a plaintiff in its opinion upholding trans sports bans. It’s a vile attempt to keep his name on Trump’s shortlist for Supreme Court nominees.
New York City will give nearly $9 million to local organizations that provide gender-affirming care to minors, including puberty blockers and hormone therapy. This comes after two major hospital systems in the city struck deals with the Trump administration to stop providing such care. The money will come from the $15 million fund Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced in June, though his administration faced criticism over the fact that this was significantly less than the $55 million he pledged during his campaign.
Legacy media fails
The Associated Press published a story calling mifepristone the “main” abortion pill—but mifepristone doesn’t work well on its own. It only works well in combination with a second drug, misoprostol, which does work on its own and was in use as an abortion pill before mifepristone was even invented. If there’s a “main” abortion pill, it’s misoprostol. And this isn’t the first time an abortion-related AP story has been in our hall of shame.
Hello, @apnews.com. Mifepristone is not “the nation’s main abortion pill.” It only works well in combination with another drug, misoprostol. Misoprostol actually DOES work well on its own. If there’s a “main” abortion pill, it’s that one.
— Garnet Henderson (@garnethenderson.com) October 8, 2026 at 11:54 AM
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Quick hits
- A researcher says it’s a myth that men commit sexual violence because they don’t understand consent. “Sexual violence is not a mistake,” says Nicole Bedera. “It is an intentionally made decision by people who know they don’t have consent. They just don’t prioritize consent over things like status, power, domination, and sexual gratification.”
- A growing measles outbreak in Pennsylvania is impacting prenatal care and raising questions about early vaccinations for babies—and it may be a grim sign of things to come across the country.
- Women are less likely than men to have jobs that offer paid time off. About 7 million more women than men lack paid leave, according to new federal data.
- “A pair of nonprofit organizations announced they will abolish nearly $34 million in medical debt for 21,490 Kansans.”
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