As state abortion bans snap into effect after the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, one group who will be most affected seems to be least discussed: women under criminal court control.
For these women — the vast majority of whom are poor and disproportionally Black or Latina — state surveillance and control of their bodies are not new. Women in prison and jails are often shackled during childbirth, separated from their children, violently searched and denied basic medical care.
Dobbs makes things worse. An estimated 58,000 pregnant women enter prisons and jails each year. For incarcerated women, obtaining an abortion and access to reproductive health care was already nearly impossible, despite several court decisions upholding the right of people in prison to access abortion. In antiabortion states, of course, it is now completely impossible. This is also true of women sentenced in federal court, and in Washington, D.C., who may be sent to a federal prison in an anti-abortion state. For women incarcerated in states with abortion bans, traveling to another state is out of the question, as is accessing abortion medication by mail.
