How a California doctor is putting red states’ abortion bans to the test | Opinion
A battle is brewing between red and blue states over mail-access abortion medication, and California is already on the front lines: On Tuesday, the governor and attorney general of Louisiana issued a warrant for the arrest of a Bay Area doctor who allegedly provided abortifacents by mail in 2023, demanding he face charges that could result in fines and up to 50 years in prison.
But California will not be bullied into submission by red states.
It is likely that this case, and a similar case that targets another doctor in the state of New York, will ultimately find their way to the U.S. Supreme Court and test the limits of liberal state “shield” laws that aim to protect blue state health care providers from red state anti-abortion laws. It will undoubtedly be a litmus test for abortion rights nationwide.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has already hinted at the long fight ahead with an official statement regarding Louisiana’s warrant for Sonoma County doctor, Remy Coeytaux, released Wednesday. Coeytaux has provided no public comment on the matter.
“California protects patients and their doctors,” Newsom said in the statement. “We will not be complicit in efforts to strip away their privacy, autonomy or dignity.”
Similarly, after New York received a similar order for abortion provider Dr. Margaret Carpenter last February, Gov. Kathy Hochul said she “will not be signing an extradition order that came from the governor of Louisiana, not now, not ever.”
Louisiana has some of the nation’s strictest laws surrounding abortion, with a near-total ban on the procedure, including in cases of rape or incest.
“Now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe (v. Wade), Louisiana is enforcing its trigger ban which prohibits abortion entirely and includes civil and criminal penalties,” writes The Center for Reproductive Rights.
These lawsuits are clearly intended to curry favor with an administration that rewards collaborators. But it places California, New York and other blue states in a difficult legal position — extradition between the states is not typically a matter of debate.
But it’s clear that blue state governments now under attack must protect medical professionals from these spurious lawsuits, which are clearly only intended to advance a twisted moral viewpoint, not to protect the health of women or children.
How do I know that’s their motivation? Because Louisiana, with their strict abortion laws, also leads the nation in maternal mortality. A pregnant mother is four times more likely to die in Louisiana than in California, according to data from the Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation working for a more equitable U.S. health care system.
The state has been particularly proactive in pursuing providers of medicinal abortion sent by mail. Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill compared Coeytaux to a drug dealer, and told The Associated Press that she believes this was “not the only time (Coeytaux) sent abortion pills into our state,” and that “it probably won’t be the last time we will indict him.”
Former state senator Nancy Skinner, who was the author of one of California’s strongest shield law legislation, Senate Bill 345, said she was proud of Newsom for upholding the state’s protections.
“The way we look at it, this is something between the medical practitioner and the patient,” Skinner, who now sits on the California Energy Commission. “Our legislation is clear that California will protect people’s reproductive rights and the practitioners who provide those services.”
It has not yet been announced who is representing Coeytaux in Louisiana, but The Center for Reproductive Rights is representing the doctor against a separate civil charge in Texas filed last July. There, Coeytaux is the subject of a federal lawsuit filed by a man who alleges the doctor provided abortion medication to his pregnant girlfriend.
“While we can’t comment on this matter itself, one thing is clear — the state of Louisiana is going after doctors for allegedly harming women, yet they are enforcing an abortion ban that puts women’s lives at risk every day,” said Nancy Northup, president of the Center, in a written statement.
Surely Louisiana’s Gov. Jeff Landry believes in state’s rights? Well, guess what — California has them, too.
It is urgently necessary that California, and any other state where medical practitioners are targeted for providing medicine to women seeking reproductive care, refuse to comply and uphold their shield laws to the fullest extent.
