“Make no mistake: half of the state is less free today than they were yesterday because of Republicans in the legislature and Kim Reynolds,” Iowa House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst said on Monday. “There’s just no other way to look at it.”
The Windsor Heights Democrat was speaking about the state’s near-total abortion ban, which took effect at 8 a.m. on Monday morning. Konfrst was one of several leaders participating in an Iowa Democratic Party (IDP) online news conference just hours after the ban began.
“I heard from someone over the weekend who’s concerned because she was afraid she might have an ectopic pregnancy, and she was afraid of what would happen to her when she got to the hospital,” Konfrst said. “She talked about confusion, she talked about fear, and she talked about a lot of different information out there that’s confusing her. And she’s in a time of crisis and she didn’t know what would happen next.”
Individual patients may not know what will happen next under the new law that prohibits approximately 97 percent of the abortions that had been occurring in the state, according to Planned Parenthood. But Dr. Francesca Turner, an OB-GYN in Des Moines and co-founder of Iowans for Health Liberty, pointed out that there are already examples of the impact such restrictive abortions bans have had on states in the two years since Roe v. Wade was overturned.
“We’ve seen this again and again in Texas or Idaho, where women are life-flighted out because the doctor can’t decide how many organs a woman should lose before they can save your life,” Turner, an OB/GYN in Des Moines and co-founder of Iowans for Health Liberty, said. “Is it a kidney? Uterus? What should we risk? What should this woman have to risk?”
The new law contains narrow and burdensome exemptions for rape and incest, and allows for abortion after an ultrasound probe can detect any cardiac activity in an embryo if an embryo or fetus has a condition “incompatible with life,” the life of the patient is in immediate danger, or continuing the pregnancy would pose a “serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function” for the patient. The law specifically prohibits consideration of the mental health impact of the pregnancy.
In states with abortions bans that have similar limited exemptions, women experiencing medical emergencies that previously would have been treated with an abortion have been denied that care because physicians are worried about losing their licenses if authorities second-guess their decisions, or because hospitals have adopted policies that require a patient to be in immediate risk of death or irreparable major organ damage before receiving an abortion.
Such bans have impacts beyond derailing care for patients, Turner explained.
“We also know that women who are denied abortion care are more likely to be victims of domestic violence,” she said.
That domestic violence can be fatal. Turner referenced a study published in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons in February that found “homicides of women who are pregnant or recently pregnant occur at significantly higher rates in states that have limited access to abortion. This state-based trend was not observed in homicides of men, suggesting that access to reproductive health care services may be one factor of many that increase a woman’s risk of intimate partner homicide.”
“There are people who are calling themselves pro-life but whose life are they protecting?” Turner asked. “Certainly not women because women will be harmed and die because of this law.”
They also aren’t protecting infants, the doctor said, pointing to a study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine in January that states with the most restrictive abortion bans have a 16 percent higher infant mortality rate compared to states where the right to an abortion is protected.
Strict abortion bans in other states have led to doctors in all fields leaving those states in higher numbers than they otherwise would have, Turner said.
“We know that Iowans need to engage and learn who voted for this abortion ban and hold them accountable this November,” Konfrst said.
In 2022, IDP leaders expressed confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strip federal protection for the right to abortion and Gov. Kim Reynolds’ frequently stated intention to severely restrict access to abortion in the state would rally voters to support Democratic candidates. That didn’t happen. Even though all polling showed clear majorities of Iowans supported the right to an abortion, Republicans increased their majorities in the Iowa House and Senate.
IDP leaders believe it will be different this year, now that a severely restrictive abortion law is no longer just a theoretical possibility, but is now a fact of life in Iowa.
The ban has attracted attention beyond Iowa’s borders. The BBC ran a story about it (“It is among the most restrictive policies to be enforced since Americans lost the national right to abortion access two years ago.”), as did other international news outlets like Germany’s Deutsche Welle (“One of the United States’ strictest abortion laws came into effect in the midwestern state of Iowa on Monday immediately banning most abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy — before many women even know they are pregnant.”) and Australia’s SBS (“The legislature’s Republican majority rebuffed efforts by Democrats to expand the law’s exceptions, including a proposal to allow abortions for pregnant children aged 12 or under.”)
Neighboring governors in states that protect the right to an abortion addressed the ban on social media on Monday.
“In Minnesota, we take care of our neighbors. It’s just what we do,” Gov. Tim Walz wrote. “As our neighbors in Iowa are stripped of their fundamental rights, my message is clear: Your reproductive freedom will remain protected in Minnesota.”
“Iowa’s disturbing 6-week abortion ban goes into effect today. Here in Illinois, we will welcome our Iowan neighbors for reproductive freedom and whatever care they need,” Gov. J.B. Pritzker tweeted.
“Please know – as you work to maneuver around this dangerous and unjust law – we are here for you.”
Pritzker also signed a bill addressing inequities in reproductive health care on Monday. Among its other provisions, it requires Illinois-based health insurance programs to cover abortion care at no additional cost, and eliminates deductibles for medications used in those procedures.
Vice President Kamala Harris released a brief video Monday morning, responding to the ban in a national context and as an issue in her run for president.
“Today Iowa put into place a Trump abortion ban, which makes Iowa the 22nd state in our country to have a Trump abortion ban,” the vice president began. “… And what this means is that one-in-three women of reproductive age in America lives in a state with a Trump abortion ban.”
Harris said, “what we need to do is vote.”
“When I am president of the United States, I will sign into law the protections for reproductive freedom. So let’s get this done,” she pledged.
Of course any legislation restoring the rights the Supreme Court eliminated in 2022 would face fierce opposition from Republicans in Congress, and legal challenges that would likely end up before the high court, where the Republican-appointed majority has demonstrated its hostility to reproductive choice.
Reserving Iowa’s abortion ban at the state level would be an even bigger challenge. First, it would require a new governor. Gov. Reynolds or any successor she would endorse would certainly veto a bill restoring the right to an abortion in Iowa up to 20 weeks into a pregnancy. The next election for governor is still two years away.
Democrats would also need to take control of the legislature, or at least hold enough seats to push through legislation working with a few Republicans who support reproductive freedom. Currently Republicans hold a 64-seat majority in the 100-member Iowa House, and control the Iowa Senate by an even larger margin, 34-16.
But as IDP Chair Rita Hart emphasized in the news conference, voting is the only way to change that and it is important that the parry make that case to voters.
“We now have fewer than 100 days until the November election, and so we are asking Iowans to start making a plan to vote,” Hart said. “Our lives, our livelihoods and healthcare are on the ballot. We need to bring back common sense and balance to Iowa government. That can only happen with a stronger Democrat presence in our state legislature.”
Konfrst also emphasized the importance of voting in November’s election, but added that, “today we need to make sure that women know that there are resources out there available to them should they find themselves in a time of crisis. Women in this state are not alone because we will look out for each other and help women get the care.”
Konfrst encouraged people to Iowans for Reproductive Freedom’s site “and click on the care link, and that is how you can get information on how to get care. There are resources available for Iowa.”
The care page has links to Abortion Finder, a national database of providers; Ineedana.com, a site with information on abortion in all states; Planned Parenthood North Central States, which has clinics in Iowa and has expanded services in Nebraska and Minnesota to treat Iowans affected by the ban; the Emma Goldman Clinic in Iowa City, which is still providing care within the limitation created by the new law; the Family Planning Council of Iowa, which provides resources for sexual and reproductive healthcare; and the Iowa Abortion Access Fund, which helps people in Iowa and the Illinois side of the Quad Cities cover the cost of abortion care and has partnered with the Chicago Abortion Fund “to provide comprehensive, wraparound support to Iowans in need of abortion care.”
“Should they find themselves in a time of crisis, women in this state are not alone,” Konfrst said. “Because we will look out for each other and help women get the care they need.”
