Conn. poised to become ‘safe harbor’ for abortion patients
Once the first state in America to enact an explicit ban on abortions, Connecticut is now poised to become a safe haven for patients seeking abortion services should the Supreme Court follow through on a reported draft decision to overturn the right to choose, experts said Tuesday.
A decision to overturn the half-century-old precedent set by Roe v. Wade — reflected in the draft opinion published by Politico — would have far reaching consequences for abortion access in the United States, where roughly two dozen states are expected to curtail legal abortions in nearly all instances.
Connecticut, however, is one of a handful of states that have codified abortion rights in state law, having done so in 1990. Lawmakers went even further this year, passing legislation to thwart attempts by other states to investigate patients who travel to Connecticut seeking access to safe and legal abortions.
“We will be one of the states that continue to protect the right of people to make their own private health care decisions,” said Dr. Nancy Stanwood, the section chief of Family Planning at the Yale
School of Medicine. “I think that we can be assured that for the people who live in Connecticut, that if they should need abortion care it’s available.”
Connecticut saw 9,202 abortions performed in 2019, the latest year for which data is available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The percentage of abortion patients who traveled from other states to Connecticut that year, 3.6 percent, was among the lowest the nation.
Part of the reason for low number of patients traveling from out of state is likely that neighboring states like New York and Massachusetts already have robust access to abortion services through clinics and hospitals. The advent of new laws limiting abortion access in far-flung states, however, has already forced some patients to travel farther to seek services, providers say.
“We’re already seeing patients from other states, particularly Texas, seeking care in Connecticut now that they’re unable to obtain that care in their own states,” Amanda Skinner, CEO of Planned Parenthood of Southern New England, said Tuesday. “And we’re preparing for the possibility of an influx.”
Skinner said she was “furious” about the leaked opinion but that Connecticut remains positioned to be a safe haven for abortion patients. She said the state legislature’s bill passed last week, which awaits a signature from Gov. Ned Lamont, expands the categories of medical professionals who can perform abortions, allowing Connecticut to meet any increased demand.
“The passage of this bill couldn’t have come soon enough, because we need to do everything we can in a state like Connecticut to expand access to abortion care for our patients and for patients who might come in from other states,” she said.
Leaders of the legislature’s Reproductive Rights Caucus responded to the news of the leaked opinion with a promise to protect Connecticut’s status as a “safe harbor” for patients and doctors who are forced to leave their home states due to laws that criminalize abortion services.
“People who come here for care, we will protect them. Providers who come here and provide care, we will protect them. People who assist others in obtaining care, we will protect them,” said State Rep. Matt Blumenthal, D- Stamford, a co-chairman of the caucus.
Pro-choice sentiments prevail in Connecticut
As officials in more conservative states eagerly await the chance to restrict or ban abortion in the event Roe v. Wade is overturned, top lawmakers in Connecticut on Tuesday restated their commitment to abortion access.
In a statement Tuesday, Lamont’s campaign reaffirmed his support for the newly passed legislation to blunt the impact of anti-abortion laws in other states, saying he intends to sign the bill when it reaches his desk.
“Governor Lamont is incredibly proud of the progress Connecticut has made in protecting a woman’s right to receive safe abortion care,” the campaign said in a statement. “The governor will continue to do anything in his power to defend those rights, which includes using his office and platform to advocate and fight for a woman’s right to choose.”
Whereas nationally abortion is often a sharply partisan issue, in Connecticut at least some key Republicans have taken prochoice stances, indicating they would not seek to limit abortion access if they gained control of the state legislature. Last week’s abortion legislation passed with support from a handful of Republicans, as well as most Democrats.
Bob Stefanowski, the presumed Republican nominee in this year’s gubernatorial election, said in a statement Tuesday that “the leaked Supreme Court opinion doesn’t change anything here in Connecticut.”
“In Connecticut, a woman’s right to choose is fully protected under state law,” Stefanowski said.
A Stefanowski spokesperson did not respond to a question about whether the candidate would veto anti-abortion legislation if it were presented to him as governor.
In an interview Tuesday morning, Rep. Laura Devlin, a Fairfield Republican and Stefanowski’s running mate, offered a similar view.
“[The pending Supreme Court decision] doesn’t affect anything in the state of Connecticut,” she said. “Roe v. Wade is codified in state law, so whatever the Supreme Court does, it doesn’t affect the state of Connecticut.”
House Minority Leader Vincent Candelora, R-North Branford, said he supported states having the right to set their own abortion lawsc, but he considered the issue settled in Connecticut.
“What we’re seeing in states like Texas is something that I think Connecticut residents would take issue with,” he said. “And it’s why part of that legislation was trying to protect Connecticut residents, which Republicans did support that concept.”
Connecticut’s abortion laws date back more than two centuries when, in 1821, the state became the first in the nation to pass an explicit prohibition on induced abortions after “quickening,” or the point at which the fetus begins to move in the womb. The state’s abortion ban remained in effect until 1973, when the Supreme Court issued its landmark ruling in Roe v. Wade.
More recently, Connecticut has become one the most firmly abortion-rights states in the country, with a majority of both Democrats and Republicans supporting legal abortion, according to a 2014 Pew poll.
A nationwide shift
Though abortion protections are enshrined in Connecticut law, experts warned that any decision to overturn Roe v. Wade would have immediate consequences for millions of Americans who live in states that are ripe for a crackdown on abortion access, particularly those in the South and Midwest.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, at least 13 states have so-called “trigger laws” curtailing abortion access that go into effect immediately upon the court’s decision to overturn its precedent.
States like Texas and Missouri have sought to get ahead of such a ruling, drafting legislation that would allow any resident to sue a doctor or patient for participating in an abortion.
After Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed such a law last year, Stanwood said she began to see patients showing up from Texas to receive abortion services at clinics in Connecticut.
“Those are people who have the resources to travel,” Stanwood said, adding, “banning abortion doesn’t make people’s need for abortion go away, and when it becomes incredibly difficult to obtain that leaves behind people who are in poverty, it leaves behind communities who historically have been disenfranchised from medicine such as people of color and communities of color.”
While the leaked opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito and confirmed by Chief Justice John Roberts openly suggests that the court’s decision would turn the issue of abortion back to the state legislatures, nothing in the decision would prohibit Congress from taking a more national approach.
Already on Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, promised to hold a vote on legislation that would codify abortion rights in federal law, though Democrats do not appear to have enough votes to eliminate the filibuster to bypass Republican opposition.
If Republicans take control of the federal government in this year’s midterms and the subsequent 2024 presidential election, they could attempt to enforce a single nationwide policy on abortion.
“Without a constitutional right, Congress is fully free to pass a statute that makes abortion a crime or just outlaws abortion in all the states,” said University of Connecticut Law Professor Anne Dailey. “Even liberal states are in danger, if we were in the future to have a Republican Congress and a Republican president. It’s not out of the question that a ban on abortion might take place on a national level or at least there would be efforts on that score.”
Though Chief Justice John Roberts confirmed the authenticity of the leaked opinion Tuesday afternoon, the court cautioned that it was not a final decision and the opinion could still be subject to revisions or even a switch in the way one or more of the justices votes.
No ruling from the Supreme Court is official until it is handed down in public by the court, typically before the end of its annual session in late June or early July.