Arizona law group is still coming for your abortion pill

The people working to preserve women’s reproductive freedom know what they’re up against.

After the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday refused to limit access to the abortion medication mifepristone, Dr. Jill Gibson, chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood Arizona, released a statement that read in part:

“The attacks brought before the Supreme Court were not based on science or for patient safety. This case was brought forward only to advance the political agenda of the same anti-abortion groups who urged the Arizona Supreme Court to enforce a total abortion ban on our communities. Even with today’s ruling, our fight is not over.”

No, not even close.

These abortion legal fights are a crusade

Because while those who want to protect a woman’s right to abortion, and to in vitro fertilization, and to contraception, think of what’s going on as a legal battle, the lawyers they’re up against consider it a war.

A holy war.

The outfit behind the abortion pill case is Scottsdale-based Alliance Defending Freedom.

They were the group behind the case that overturned Roe v. Wade. They were the group hoping to restore Arizona’s barbaric 18th century abortion ban.

After the abortion pill ruling was announced, Alliance Defending Freedom’s senior counsel, Erin Hawley, said,“While we’re disappointed with the court’s decision, we will continue to advocate for women and work to restore common-sense safeguards for abortion drugs."

This wasn’t just a legal case for the holier-than-thou warriors of the alliance. It’s part of a crusade. And the group has all the money it needs, and an army of lawyers.

Arizona needs a constitutional amendment

A while back, when the Alabama Supreme Court held that embryos created through IVF are children and can be protected under wrongful death statutes, nearly destroying the procedure’s availability, the alliance called it “a victory for life.”

Or as the alliance’s CEO Kristen Waggoner put it, “We believe that human life is precious, that it deserves protection from conception until natural death.”

GOP majority passes scheme: To save anti-abortion judges

It will take legislative or constitutional protection for women to maintain their rights, something that Arizonans will have a chance to decide in November by voting for the Arizona for Abortion Access initiative.

The necessity of that became clear on the same day as the Supreme Court decision on the abortion pill, when Republicans in the U.S. Senate blocked passage of legislation designed to protect access to in vitro fertilization.

We're the epicenter of this fight

Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer said afterwards that “sadly, after frightening decisions like the one from Alabama, not even IVF is safe in the aftermath of Roe.”

Alliance Defending Freedom is even taking its efforts internationally, working in other countries to promote its anti-abortion agenda.

There’s a reason why any mention of the group in Arizona sends a shiver up the spine of those looking to preserve women’s rights.

The alliance’s nerve center is here.

Reach Montini at [email protected].

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Alliance Defending Freedom is still coming for your abortion pill