After capturing control of key leadership positions, Texas Democrats intend to push for a repeal of the state’s near-total abortion ban, which has been linked to the death of multiple women. Texas, the largest state in the country to have banned abortion, has for years functioned as a laboratory for some of the nation’s most novel anti-abortion laws, including efforts to make it harder for Texans to circumvent the state’s ban. Now, with anti-abortion activists across the country reeling after Republicans’ historic midterm losses, the undoing — or even loosening — of abortion restrictions in Texas could signal a shift in the national reproductive rights landscape.
Democrats now control the Texas House. The governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general — three positions poised to impact abortion policy — are part of the first Democrats elected statewide in Texas since 1994. Although Democrats’ ability to dramatically change the state’s laws may be limited, they are preparing a multipronged effort to add exceptions to Texas’ abortion bans and to back away from the GOP’s aggressive interpretation and enforcement of those same laws.
On Friday, Keisha Lance Bottoms, who will be the state’s first Democratic governor since 2003, told reporters that Democrats will “begin to have those conversations” to ascertain if lawmakers might undo the state’s six-week abortion ban, which has been linked to the deaths of at least two women. Texas Republicans, who have spearheaded abortion restrictions, will retain control over the state’s Senate. But the upper chamber will now have a Democrat presiding over it.
Gov.-elect Vikki Goodwin repeatedly called for the undoing of Texas’ abortion ban, a focus her staff said she would continue. Gov.-elect Vikki Goodwin is a straight shooter, and she meant what she said on the campaign trail,” said Sophia Mirto, a spokesperson for Goodwin. Republican lawmakers have suggested they intend to redefine Goodwin’s role, which for years had become one of the most influential legislative positions in the state, to limit her ability to set legislative policy.
Goodwin will have allies in the legislature’s lower chamber. Donna Howard, a Democrat who chairs the House’s Women’s Health Caucus, filed legislation Monday that would repeal Texas’ abortion bans. Gov.-elect Gina Hinojosa has said repeatedly — including this weekend in an interview with The New York Times — that she intends to work with Republican state legislators to “prioritize making sure that doctors are no longer prosecuted” if they provide abortions for people in medical emergencies.
Some Texas Democrats spy an opening to add new exceptions to the state’s ban, particularly for people who become pregnant as a result of rape or incest, survivors of human trafficking, and those who discover fatal fetal anomalies in their pregnancies, Howard said. In the Senate, Democratic lawmakers have filed bills that would add rape and incest exceptions as well as fatal fetal anomaly exceptions to the state’s ban. But we think we could negotiate.” Beyond addressing the Texas ban, Howard said, Democrats are hoping to impose new levels of scrutiny on anti-abortion centers, non-medical facilities that in Texas receive public funding and work to discourage people from seeking abortions. (Democrats have also put forth a bill in the state Senate that would impose new regulations on how those centers advertise themselves.) Johnson, who will replace Ken Paxton as the state’s attorney general, has indicated he will not continue the anti-abortion focus that defined his Republican predecessor’s tenure, which included filing lawsuits against healthcare providers in Delaware, New York, California and the Netherlands for allegedly mailing abortion medications to people in Texas.
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