A divisive theme four months before the American presidential election. While this Thursday, June 27, a first debate will take place between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, the theme of abortion promises to be central between the Republican and the Democrat.
On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court overturned its ruling which guaranteed the federal right of American women to have an abortion, giving each state the freedom to legislate on the issue. A decision made possible by the recent appointments of conservative judges by Donald Trump.
Hours of driving
The controversial decision of the high court had direct consequences on the daily lives of women wishing to have an abortion. For two years, they have sometimes been forced to travel thousands of kilometers to go to border clinics in their state.
BFMTV went to Bristol, a city straddling Tennessee, where abortion is now prohibited, and Virginia, where it remains legal and practiced. For the year 2024 alone, Bristol Women’s Health plans to welcome 2,000 patients, a figure that is constantly increasing.
“Most of our patients have to drive two to three hours, some 12 to 14 hours. 99% of the patients I see here are from a state other than Virginia,” Karolina Ogorek, director, confirms to our camera. of the establishment.
In addition, women who make an appointment at this clinic in order to have an abortion are also subject to pressure from anti-abortion activists, who campaign nearby.
“I come here between two and four days a week. I come here to plead with women, about what brings them, so that they do not take the life of a child,” Debra Mehaffey told BFMTV again. “God has engraved his principles in your heart, you know it’s wrong,” she shouts to a patient who enters the premises.
Fractured society
The day after June 24, 2022, the first states banned terminations of pregnancies on their soil, forcing clinics to close urgently or move to more welcoming areas.
Since then, the country has been fractured between the twenty or so states having decreed bans or strong restrictions, mainly located in the South and center, and those on the coasts, which have adopted new protections.
The decision of the American temple of law also had profound political repercussions: since the Court’s ruling, conservatives have lost almost every referendum or vote that raised the question of abortion. And this, even in states which are usually largely won by them, such as Ohio, Alabama or Kansas.
Over the past two years, “the pro-abortion movement has discovered that Americans care much more about this right than they had anticipated,” notes Professor Mary Ziegler of the University of California, Davis. “And so they are trying to take advantage of this situation through electoral initiatives,” she explains to AFP.
The Democrats are capitalizing on this burning issue, hoping to capture valuable votes, particularly among women and young people, for the presidential election in November.
President Joe Biden, a practicing Catholic who has long been cautious on the issue, has himself become a champion of abortion rights, which has earned him the support of several family planning organizations in his campaign for a second term.
Original article published on BFMTV.com
