In the United States if you are a fertile woman, particularly if you are a non-White woman, you don’t want to get pregnant in a Republican controlled state and have something go wrong. Not only may you find it is impossible to get needed medical care you may end up getting arrested and being sent to prison.
Pregnancy criminalization occurs when a pregnant person is arrested for reasons related to their pregnancy or when terms of bail, sentencing, or probation are tightened because they become pregnant after they are charged with an unrelated crime.
In most cases, pregnancy provides a “but for” factor, meaning that but for the pregnancy, the criminal penalty taken against the pregnant person would not have occurred.
Where are these cases from?
This report looks at cases of criminalized pregnancy from January 1, 2006 through June 23, 2022, the day before the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. Pregnancy Justice identified cases of criminalized pregnancy via legal databases, referrals from experts, the organization’s own involvement in cases, and media coverage. Case documentation was gathered from public records requests, court dockets, internet searches, and direct contact with the attorneys or parties involved in the cases. The case materials were reviewed and data about the cases were collected systematically. Only categories that contain five or more cases are displayed in the graphs on this page.
This is what is happening to women, what they are driven to in Republican controlled states. I have to confess that I do not see how it is possible to be a woman and vote Republican, yet I recognize that millions of women do this.
Jessica Burgess, center, alongside her attorney, Brad Ewalt, right, is escorted out of the Madison County District courtroom by Madison County Sheriff Todd Volk, in Madison, Nebraska, on Friday.
A Nebraska mother who was accused of helping her 17-year-old daughter have an illegal abortion and disposing of the fetuswas sentenced to two years in prison on Friday, the Norfolk Daily News reported.
The sentence comes after Jessica Burgess, 42, pleaded guilty in July to two felonies – removing, concealing or abandoning a dead human body, and performing an abortion beyond 20 weeks – and a misdemeanor charge of false reporting.
CNN has reached out to Burgess’s attorney, the Madison Countyattorney and the Madison County District Court for comment.
Burgess’s daughter, Celeste Burgess, now 19, was sentenced in July to 90 days in jail after pleading guilty to a felony charge of removing, concealing or abandoning a dead human body.
Kasey Meehan, Jonathan Friedman, Sabrina Baeta, and Tasslyn Magnusson, - PEN America
Stephan:
States, both Red and Blue, are having their libraries attacked by hysterical semi-literate White people, mostly women, who seek to purge their libraries of books they often haven’t read, nor seem to understand. There is a growing anti-intellectualism in the United States that is doing massive damage to libraries, once seen as cherished sources of self–improvement. You can stop this nonsense. Go to whatever organization controls the libraries in your schools and community and register your support for them, and your objection to censorship.
Introduction
The freedom to read is under assault in the United States—particularly in public schools—curtailing students’ freedom to explore words, ideas, and books. In the 2022–23 school year, from July 1, 2022, to June 31, 2023, PEN America recorded 3,362 instances of book bans in US public school classrooms and libraries. These bans removed student access to 1,557 unique book titles, the works of over 1,480 authors, illustrators, and translators. Authors whose books are targeted are most frequently female, people of color, and/or LGBTQ+ individuals. Amid a growing climate of censorship, school book bans continue to spread through coordinated campaigns by a vocal minority of groups and individual actors and, increasingly, as a result of pressure from state legislation.
Key Findings
Book bans in public K–12 schools continue to intensify. In the 2022–23 school year, PEN America recorded 3,362 instances of books banned, an increase of 33 percent from the 2021–22 school year.
Over 40 percent of all book bans occurred in school districts in Florida. Across 33 school districts, PEN America recorded 1,406 book ban […]
Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott and Alex Mierjeski, - ProPublica
Stephan:
Think about this. Clarence Thomas is one of the six human beings who define the laws that control the wellbeing of the 339,996,562 rest of us and who is, on the basis of incontrovertible evidence, utterly corrupt. And yet nothing is being done. He should leave the court one way or another. That nothing is happening is the measure of the dysfunction of the American federal government
Thomas’ 2018 disclosure form did not include his trip to the Koch donor summit in Palm Springs. Credit: the Free Law Project
On Jan. 25, 2018, dozens of private jets descended on Palm Springs International Airport. Some of the richest people in the country were arriving for the annual winter donor summit of the Koch network, the political organization founded by libertarian billionaires Charles and David Koch. A long weekend of strategizing, relaxation in the California sun and high-dollar fundraising lay ahead.
Just after 6 p.m., a Gulfstream G200 jet touched down on the tarmac. One of the Koch network’s most powerful allies was on board: Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
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During the summit, the justice went to a private dinner for the network’s donors. Thomas has attended Koch donor events at least twice over the years, according to interviews with three former network employees and one major donor. The justice was brought in to speak, staffers said, in the hopes that such access would encourage donors to continue […]
If you look at McConnell, or Feinstein, and a number of others you can see that they are beyond their optimal age, and should consider resigning. It’s not just age, look at Nancy Pelosi, it’s cognitive competence. But age is an issue. We have the oldest government in our history. To quote the RAND study, “In 1981, only 4 percent of Congress was over the age of 70. By 2022, that number had spiked to 23 percent.”
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., looks on during a news conference with Senate Republicans at the U.S. Capitol on July 26, 2023, in Washington, D.C. Credit: Drew Angerer / Getty
As the nation security workforce ages, dementia impacting U.S. officials poses a threat to national security, according to a first-of-its-kind study by a Pentagon-funded think tank. The report, released this spring, came as several prominent U.S. officials trusted with some of the nation’s most highly classified intelligence experienced public lapses, stoking calls for resignations and debate about Washington’s aging leadership.
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who had a second freezing episode last month, enjoys the most privileged access to classified information of anyone in Congress as a member of the so-called Gang of Eight congressional leadership. Ninety-year-old Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., whose decline has seen her confused about how to vote and experiencing memory lapses — forgetting conversations and not recalling a monthslong absence — was for years a member of the Gang of Eight and remains a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, on which she has served since 2001.
