T.R.A.P is the most effective tool in the anti-choicer toolbox. Do you know what it is?

[cali]

IT WAS COUNSELING DAY LAST SPRING at the Hope Medical Group for Women, a small brick abortion clinic tucked discreetly along a street of upscale shops in Shreveport, Louisiana. In the waiting room, pregnant women paged through magazines. At the front desk, a receptionist monitored the clinic’s perimeter on an overhead screen and buzzed in patients through a locked door, alert for signs of trouble from anti-abortion activists. Robin Rothrock, the clinic administrator, was preparing for the day’s appointments when the telephone rang.

The caller, a pro-choice attorney who represented the clinic, had some disturbing news: The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had thrown out a lawsuit filed by Rothrock and four other providers that challenged Louisiana’s newest anti-abortion law, a measure so sweeping it could instantly shut down every clinic in the state. The “civil-liability law,” as it’s usually called, would allow any woman who has had the procedure to sue the doctor for up to 10 years—not just for her own injuries, but also for “damages occasioned by the unborn child.” With no limit to the amount doctors could be ordered to pay, one big judgment in favor of a woman who regretted her abortion could drive a clinic out of business.

Earlier, a lower federal court had found the law unconstitutional, saying it would limit women’s access to abortions by discouraging doctors from providing them. But the appellate judges reversed the decision, ruling that providers could not sue the state over the issue in federal court.

<snip>

http://barryyeoman.com/2001/09/the-quiet-war-on-abortion/

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) vowed in December to make abortion in Texas "a thing of the past," and Republican state legislators obliged him on Tuesday by advancing a bill that opponents say could close 37 out of the state's 42 existing abortion clinics.

Senate Bill 537, part of a growing national trend of so-called "TRAP" (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) bills, would require all abortion clinics in Texas to meet the same physical requirements as ambulatory surgical centers, even if they do not perform surgical abortions. Clinics would have to have surgical operating rooms of at least 240 square feet, specific flooring for janitors' closets, and new ventilation systems that can sterilize operating rooms and regulate the humidity of administrative offices -- all requirements that would be hard to fulfill.

<snip>

Only five of the 42 clinics in Texas are currently licensed as ambulatory surgical centers, according to a Planned Parenthood spokesperson. If the bill becomes law, the other 37 clinics will either be forced to close down or to undergo costly and extensive building renovations in order to comply. The five clinics that would remain open are in Texas' major metropolitan areas -- Dallas, Houston, Austin and San Antonio -- so women in most rural parts of Texas would have to drive much farther in order to access abortion care.

Texas legislators have already passed a mandatory ultrasound law, a law mandating a 24-hour waiting period before abortions and a law prohibiting Planned Parenthood from participating in the state's low-income Women's Health Program.

<snip>

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/20/texas-abortion-bill_n_2918682.html


Roe has become increasingly and frighteningly less relevant. In more states than not, obtaining an abortion is difficult, humiliating and expensive. In other words, for millions of women in the U.S. there is no real access.

[Scootaloo]

1. it's rather telling, isn't it?

Republicans fall over themselves to institute the lowest possible caps for lawsuit awards. They call it "tort reform," and argue it's a must for business to remain operable.

With no limit to the amount doctors could be ordered to pay, one big judgment in favor of a woman who regretted her abortion could drive a clinic out of business.

I'll bet they think they're clever.

[cali]

2. Alas, they are clever. That law was held up by the Appeals Court.

[davidpdx]

3. I have heard about the requirements for doctors offices

and the regulations that were passed in Mississippi that abortion providers had to have hospital privileges. Sadly I think in the conservative states they have found the scheme to shut down clinics. The only way to reverse it is either 1) To get a Democratic legislature and governor or 2) Through a court challenge. Neither one seem to be very good prospects.