Deep down she already knows. She feels weird, different. Pain in her breasts. But still: such a test. ‘I wanted to keep in denial,’ says Victoria, an exchange student, 20 years old. So she drinks strong tea, made from fresh oregano, a recipe from her mother in Peru for when your period is due. Nothing. “Just take that test,” says her friend L. (19). “At least then we’ll know.”
She reacts calmly to the result. Icy almost. “Don’t worry,” she says, “I’ll fix it.” She calls a friend in Peru and then cries, just for a moment. But Victoria also decides – because that’s how she is – not to lose a second.
4:55 p.m. At Planned Parenthood in Salt Lake City, one of three clinics in the US state of Utah, is still being admitted. ‘Yes. Yes! Please, the first possible moment. Tomorrow morning? Perfect!’
The clinic is in the basement of an unsightly office building. Carpet, boxes, suspended ceiling. Victoria has to watch a video. After that, a cooling-off period of 72 hours will start, which is required by law. On Monday she will get a pill, the doctor says, so it’s over. On the way back, Victoria jokes with her boyfriend again. “Can I feel your belly?” ‘No!’ It’s the relief.
‘I thought: thank God this is happening here,’ says Victoria, ‘and not in Peru.’ There, in her home country, abortion is prohibited.
Chaos
Karrie Galloway (71), director of Planned Parenthood Utah, is working above the clinic that same Friday when her world explodes: the US Supreme Court has the historic ruling Roe v Wade dismantled. The federal right to abortion has been lifted – and the fight of her life has begun.
Galloway sees chaos erupt in the country. Thirteen states ban abortion with ‘trigger laws’, which come into effect immediately. Utah too, although parliament has yet to ratify the law. ‘We only have a few hours,’ she tells her employees.
All those laws, everywhere, untested: the US has plunged into legal purgatory. ‘Citizens, healthcare workers, politicians, patients’, Galloway says, ‘no one seems to know what rules apply anymore.’ And what the risks are.
Take a state like Michigan. The only law in the books suddenly turns out to be an old one from 1931. Will it come into effect now? No, Attorney General Dana Nessel, who once had an abortion herself, promises: “I will not prosecute girls, women or doctors.” But legal guarantees do not exist. The same goes for Wisconsin and West Virginia, where 19th-century laws were never repealed. In these states abortion is now perhaps punishable. Only one prosecutor has to decide to prosecute.
Galloway watches clinic after clinic close, totaling more than a quarter of the 790 in the US. Some close because they have to, others because they no longer dare. Thousands of appointments are cancelled.
Galloway decides to keep helping patients until they can’t anymore. That Friday night, the Utah legislature finally ratified the ban. 41 years after Karrie Galloway took office as director, her clinic has to close. But Galloway is more than just angry, disappointed and sad: she has a plan of attack.
Too young, too poor
Victoria does not follow any news in the US. Why would she? The Peruvian is here temporarily. An employee of the clinic calls. At first she thinks he means: moved. But she can’t make another appointment. Abortion is suddenly banned in all of Utah.
Victoria gets dizzy on the phone. For the first time since she knew she was pregnant, she felt fear.
Keeping the child was never a consideration. Victoria and L. didn’t have to have that conversation. They met a few months ago through an app. They’re too young, too poor, don’t even have a car – what are they supposed to do with a baby?
The employee starts talking about Colorado: abortion is still allowed there. Or Nevada. Idaho maybe, that’s unclear. Victoria tries to keep her wits about her. She has never been to any of those states.
Only towards the end of the conversation does the employee offer a glimmer of hope. “The chances of us winning are really slim,” Victoria hears in her ear, “but we’re going to go to court.”
fight
For years, Karrie Galloway has been working towards exactly this moment. When Donald J. Trump was elected president in 2016, and he promised to target abortion, she already started building a case.
For years, Galloway and her lawyers ransacked the Utah Constitution. They picked points from it, seven to be exact, which may be with the trigger law be in conflict. They prepared their argument down to the last detail.
People around her were skeptical. It wouldn’t go that fast, would it? But Galloway didn’t hesitate for a second. This was serious, and in Utah abortion wouldn’t stand a chance at all. Here the Mormons rule, the dominant faith in the state. They are not big fans of abortion. “Utah is a friendly state,” Galloway says, “with an unkind heart.”
The file was already ready. On Saturday morning, 24 hours after Roe v Wade’s waiver, Planned Parenthood Utah filed a suit in Salt Lake City’s Third District Court. The fight has begun.
Alternatives
Victoria and her boyfriend always do it with a condom. For real. Okay, maybe a few times without it. But they had calculated the days when it should be possible. What is the probability?
They dare not tell their parents. Victoria’s mother herself had an abortion in Peru as a teenager, illegally, an experience that traumatized her forever. Afterwards she regretted it. Victoria: ‘If my mother found out I was pregnant, she would force me to keep it.’ What L.’s parents would say? ‘I don’t know. They would at least scream.’
So they search diligently for alternatives. A ticket to Colorado costs $500. Victoria has a side job, although she is not allowed to do so with her visa. Maybe she can earn enough in time?
She calls the clinic in Denver. There is a storm, she hears: everyone suddenly wants an appointment. The next spot is in a week. Because she is insured as a student in Utah, the procedure costs as much as $600. There is also an overnight stay, food, drink – no, they don’t have that money.
party buses
Galloway is not the only one to resist. Abortion clinics are filing lawsuits in Louisiana, Florida, Arizona, South Carolina, Florida, Kentucky, Texas, Idaho, Mississippi. The battleground has moved from national politics to the local court. Each state has its own constitution and procedures. The legal tangle is not for anyone to oversee.
In Utah, the momentum is picking up. On Monday afternoon, Galloway is told, an emergency hearing is already taking place. The chances of success seem slim. She prepares for the worst.
Can’t they still do something for patients, even with a ban? Galloway has an idea: Party buses leave every day from puritan Utah to Nevada, the state of Las Vegas, where everything from prostitution to marijuana is allowed. No one to stop that. Can’t her clinic do something like that? shuttle buses for abortion; no law says anything about that.
The same goes for sending abortion pills to other states. In principle it is possible, during the corona crisis consultations also took place remotely. But then, what risk do you run? Can you be prosecuted for sending an abortion pill? No one has the answer. Clinics across the country are grappling with these questions.
The US has a legal system built on precedent. Cases refer back to previous cases. After all, Roe v Wade was also a statement, not a law. Often the rules are only clear after a judge has ruled. Galloway would, in fact, use her employees as test subjects. Too risky. The shuttle buses and pills are going off the track.
last gasp
The case is due Monday afternoon. Galloway decides to wait in the clinic. Judgment comes after half an hour. According to the judge, the ban was implemented hastily. “Many Utahans are being forced to complete a pregnancy they’ve already decided to terminate,” Judge Andrew Stone ruled, “with all the physical, emotional and financial consequences that entails.”
Galloway is right. The ban is temporarily blocked.
The wave of local resistance is paying off. The same day, a judge in Louisiana rules the same. Success in Florida follows. The panic, meanwhile, is moving to the other side. It turns out that the Republican states can’t get rid of abortion that simple. Laws that seemed to be in cans are not watertight after all.
Galloway has no illusions: this is mainly a stay of execution. New, boarded-up laws are only a matter of time. By next week, her resistance could already be broken, when the judge re-examines the file. Her hope is that he decides to block the ban for the entire duration of the lawsuit. Such a case can take weeks, months, even years. Think about how many women she can help during that time. “I’ll keep going until my last gasp,” she says.
After the verdict, Galloway falls in the arms of her employees. There is cheering, briefly, and then: get to work. Minutes after the verdict, Karrie Galloway reopens the doors of her clinic to patients. Those are not long in coming.
Pill
When she picks up the phone, Victoria can’t believe her ears. “It’s possible?” she exclaims. ‘Are you sure?’ Yes, says the employee. If she can be there in 45 minutes. Victoria calls L., apologizes at work, and sprints to the bus stop.
This time there are people with protest signs in front of the clinic. Men. They offer her money not to go in. Victoria ignores them. In the waiting room they watch YouTube videos against the tension. Then she is summoned. L. nervously paces in front of the clinic door.
Inside, Victoria feels real relief when she gets her hands on the box with the pill. “Here,” says the doctor, “take another one.” No one knows how long the clinic will remain open. If the first pill doesn’t work, she’s guaranteed to have a spare.
The pill does what it’s supposed to do. After an hour she starts to bleed. Victoria feels bad, good, all at once. “At first I thought I had the worst bad luck in the world,” she says, “but maybe I was the luckiest.”