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SCOTUS FAIL: How pregnancy in Texas just got so dangerous

SCOTUS FAIL: How pregnancy in Texas just got so dangerous

SCOTUS FAIL: How pregnancy in Texas just got so dangerous

Young Texas parents, excited to get pregnant and have children, now live with a slice of terror in the back of their minds.

What happens if something goes wrong? What happens if the mother gets sick, the baby is sick and dies? Will the mother have to be near death? Will she die?

Drucilla Tigner, a reproductive rights advocate in Texas — and one of the featured speakers at the Austin stop of the Just Majority Tour — said she is of child-bearing age, and these are the topics discussed among her friends.

Her point stung the gathered crowd like a wasp zipping out from the flowers, Texas Oaks, and green space around the Just Majority tour bus at its Austin, Texas, stop.

In Texas, parents that want children, like their sisters who are unable to care for a child and need reproductive services, are both victimized by the United States Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs.

Clearly, the Court is out of alignment with the views of the vast majority of Americans and must be expanded.

Congressman Greg Casar (D-TX) led off the event by noting that the battle for reproductive rights started in Austin within the Texas state government prior to the decision in Roe v. Wade. 

Casar said that expanding the Supreme Court was the nation’s “number one priority,” stating that “this Supreme Court is holding America hostage. We need to restore balance to the Court, including expanding the Court.”

Casar told the heartbreaking story of Austin resident Amanda Zurawski.

Zurawski and her husband went through eighteen months of fertility treatment. She had just completed the invitations for her baby shower when she experienced unexpected and strange symptoms.

Her doctor told her to come in at once.

Zurkowski was diagnosed with cervical insufficiency, a condition that ruptured her membranes. There was never any possibility that the fetus would be born viable, it was only a matter of when the end of the failed pregnancy would come.

She wanted the fetus to pass respectfully. The doctors told her there was nothing they could do, it would be considered an abortion and, given that Amanda’s membranes were now exposed, she herself was in grave danger.

One of two things had to happen before she could be treated.

Either the fetus had to die naturally, or Amanda had to come close enough to death that the hospital ethics board approved the abortion.

Zurkowski went into septic shock, a life-threatening condition, and due to the emergency surgery she was forced to endure, she may not be able to give birth in the future.

Rep. Casar pounded the podium in a combination of anger and sadness:

“This is 100% a result of the Dobbs decision. This Supreme Court is holding America hostage. We need to restore balance to the Court, including expanding the Court.”

Casar spoke prior to Tigner. But the point came full circle.

Most Americans understand the plight that young women, power women, and abused women face when it comes to reproductive freedoms.

Americans also know that Texas is a very big state and travel to a state with abortion rights would require either a lot of money or time, likely both.

But most Americans haven’t thought out the logical consequences of what Tigner noted about her friends — married women who want to be pregnant — but are afraid.

Rep. Casar set the tone for Tigner. Rep. Casar took a question from this writer about the possible loss of the Chevron doctrine.

The doctrine can be simplified by simply stating that courts rarely intervene in how administrative agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency, Bureau of Land Management, the National Marine Fisheries Service, along with the FDA, consumer products… Congress cannot anticipate every issue arising within a statute.

These agencies develop rules to enforce the laws. They are the experts in the area.

Judges have, for almost forty years, nearly always “deferred” to the agencies’ expertise rather than replace agency decisions with judicial interpretations.

The SCOTUS is set to overturn the Chevron doctrine this term, a judicial power grab that would allow big business to lower their expenses by not having to deal with pesky federal agencies.

Rep. Casar jumped on the question, becoming more animated and angry in his answer, stating that, “Texas had also led the way in developing environmental protection.”

Texas ranchers can’t raise healthy cattle without clean air and water.

He gripped the podium and leaned forward into the question agreeing that the problem with the hyper-partisan Supreme Court extends well beyond civil rights and into the pockets of corporate America.

Former Chairwoman of Planned Parenthood Cecile Richards also spoke with her usual combination of warmth and piercing logic. “We had always been on defense, prior to Dobbs. Now it’s time to go on offense.”

Richards said that expanding the Supreme Court was the highest priority but also pointed to working with “some” states that might be amenable to changing laws restricting abortion.

Texas is not among the list targeted. Its only hope is in Washington.

Here’s a video about the Austin stop of the Just Majority tour, courtesy of KXAN Austin.

This story was underwritten by the Just Majority campaign with funding from a 501c3 nonprofit charity. See full disclosure.

I can be reached at jasonmiciak@gmail.com and on Twitter @JasonMiciak.

Editor’s note: This is an opinion column that solely reflects the opinions of the author.

Jason Miciak
Jason Miciak is an associate editor and opinion writer for Occupy Democrats. He's a Canadian-American who grew up in the Pacific Northwest. He is a trained attorney, but for the last five years, he's devoted his time to writing political news and analysis. He enjoys life on the Gulf Coast as a single dad to a 15-year-old daughter. Hobbies include flower pots, cooking, and doing what his daughter tells him they're doing. Sign up to get all of my posts by email right here:

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