Award of Excellence: The Battle Over Abortion
The Battle Over Abortion
American women faced extreme difficulties obtaining an abortion in parts of the United States even before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade ending the constitutional right to an abortion. In the South and other parts of the United States it was nearly impossible for millions of women to get an abortion as religion and politics reshaped the debate in the direction of eroding a woman's right to choose. Dr. Shelly Tien was among an estimated 50 doctors who traveled across state lines to provide abortions in places with limited abortion access or no local doctors able or willing. When Roe was overturned June 24, 2022, a greater crisis of access exploded. 14 states banned abortion expcept in the most narrow of circumstances. Many clinics closed, forcing women to travel thousands of miles to end their pregnancies. Abortion providers like Dr. Alan Braid and Andrea Gallegos decided to uproot their families from Texas to open the clinics in New Mexico and Illinois, two states where abortion remains legal. The Supreme Court has now decided to hear a case which could restrict access to the abortion pill which accounts for more than half of U.S. abortions. As the Supreme Court prepares to rule again and abortion measures shift to the state ballot, the issue is less resolved than ever. These photographs from across the United State are an intimate look at women’s lives upended by the rollback of 50 years of precedent, the shifting abortion landscape, the people fighting to protect a woman’s right to bodily autonomy, and those morally opposed to abortion and reproductive freedom, as the battle rages on.
The Battle Over Abortion
American women faced extreme difficulties obtaining an abortion in parts of the United States even before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade ending the constitutional right to an abortion. In the South and other parts of the United States it was nearly impossible for millions of women to get an abortion as religion and politics reshaped the debate in the direction of eroding a woman's right to choose. Dr. Shelly Tien was among an estimated 50 doctors who traveled across state lines to provide abortions in places with limited abortion access or no local doctors able or willing. When Roe was overturned June 24, 2022, a greater crisis of access exploded. 14 states banned abortion expcept in the most narrow of circumstances. Many clinics closed, forcing women to travel thousands of miles to end their pregnancies. Abortion providers like Dr. Alan Braid and Andrea Gallegos decided to uproot their families from Texas to open the clinics in New Mexico and Illinois, two states where abortion remains legal. The Supreme Court has now decided to hear a case which could restrict access to the abortion pill which accounts for more than half of U.S. abortions. As the Supreme Court prepares to rule again and abortion measures shift to the state ballot, the issue is less resolved than ever. These photographs from across the United State are an intimate look at women’s lives upended by the rollback of 50 years of precedent, the shifting abortion landscape, the people fighting to protect a woman’s right to bodily autonomy, and those morally opposed to abortion and reproductive freedom, as the battle rages on.
