Reproductive care organizations in neighboring states where abortion remains legal are already seeing an influx of patients from Iowa: The Chicago Abortion Fund received more than 60 requests for help from Iowans in the first three weeks of July, a 165 percent increase from previous months.
“It’s a surprise even to me,” Executive Director Megan Jeifo said Wednesday..
In a sweeping decision issued June 28, the Iowa Supreme Court upheld the minimum level of constitutional protection for abortion rights and overturned an injunction against the law in 2023, paving the way for a near-total ban to take effect. The court on Monday denied a request for review by one of the plaintiffs, Planned Parenthood. A district court judge lifted the injunction the next day.
“We are heartbroken that Iowans have lost their ability to make personal health care decisions,” said Ruth Richardson, president of Planned Parenthood’s North Central States chapter. “We will continue to fight to restore their bodily independence.”
Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, who urged the GOP-led Legislature to pass the bill, called the court’s decision a “victory for life” this week.
“There is no cause more sacred or worthy than protecting the lives of innocent unborn children,” Reynolds said in a statement, adding that she remains “deeply committed” to supporting women planning to become mothers by “promoting adoption” and “defending in vitro fertilization.”
Richardson speculates: The number of abortions performed in Iowa will fall by at least 97 percent since Monday morning, with more than 4,000 procedures performed in the state in 2023, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a policy research organization that supports abortion rights.
Eighteen states currently have total or majority abortion bans, according to a Washington Post analysis, and reproductive rights are expected to be a key issue in this fall’s presidential election. Abortion-rights constitutional amendments are already on the ballot in five states.
The Chicago Abortion Fund has helped 465 Iowans seeking abortions and now expects a much greater need since the U.S. Supreme Court ended federal protections for abortion in 2022. Jaifo said Florida’s abortion ban, which went into effect May 1, has led to a significant increase in pregnant patients coming to Illinois from Florida and across the South.
The Iowa Abortion Access Fund has seen a 27% increase in requests for assistance since 2021, and requests so far this year are 7% higher than in 2023, officials said.
Richardson said groups in Iowa had been preparing for the ban for months. Planned Parenthood of North Central States has expanded several facilities to serve Iowa women, including doubling the number of patient beds in Omaha and moving to a larger facility in Mankato, Minnesota, he said.
Abortion measures are set to appear on the November ballot in Florida, Nevada, Colorado, South Dakota and Maryland, and activists in Arizona, Missouri and Montana are waiting to see if they have collected enough signatures to place measures on the ballot in their states. Since 2022, voters have overwhelmingly supported abortion rights on ballot issues, including in Republican-leaning states like Kansas and Ohio.
The process for amending Iowa’s constitution is complicated and could take years. Conservative lawmakers in the state introduced a bill in 2021 that would have asked voters to decide there is no right to abortion in the state, but it has not progressed.
The new law would restrict the procedure to a time when many women are unaware they are pregnant. Non-medical exceptions apply only if the sexual assault is reported to police or a health care provider within 45 days in the case of rape and 145 days in the case of incest.
