This blog on Texas education contains posts on accountability, testing, K-12 education, postsecondary educational attainment, bilingual education, immigration, school finance, environmental issues, and Ethnic Studies at the state and national levels. It addresses politics in Texas. It also represents my digital footprint, of life and career, as a community-engaged scholar in Texas.
These numbers are staggering. Tragedy layered over tragedy for rape survivors who are not getting the health care that they need.
One of my relatives was the product of a rape. His mother resented him his entire life. Clearly, his very existence was a daily reminder of the violence that befell her. I felt torn about his recounting of how she abused him as a young child, on the one hand, and how she was herself a victim, on the other. Yes, they were both "survivors," so to speak, but they both lived tough lives.
For survivors and children alike, theirs is a massive burden of fluctuating emotions of pain, anger, and despair. Now multiply this by 26,000 women in our state who are impacted by the Texas state legislature outlawing abortions. In another 16 months, will this figure double and grow to 52,000, and then to 78,000 in yet another 16 months?! This feels horrific to me, setting into motion yet another policy-induced pathology in society that will find expression in the ugliest of ways. What are these legislators thinking?!
We must restore women's reproductive rights, not the least of which is the right to an abortion under circumstances of rape or incest. The current policy is beyond cruel and inhumane.
A pregnant woman stands for a portrait in this 2023 AP file photo. Texas saw an estimated 26,313 rape-related pregnancies during the 16 months after the state outlawed all abortions with no exceptions for survivors of rape or incest, according to a study published Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
That’s the highest figure among the 14 states with total abortion bans, with Texas having the largest population, according to the study.
“Survivors who need abortion care should not have their reproductive autonomy further undermined by state policy,” said one of the authors, Dr. Kari White, of the Texas-based Resound Research for Reproductive Health.
The authors noted that while some pregnant rape survivors who need abortion care may be able to travel out of state or manage the pregnancy at home with abortion pills, the bans leave many survivors without a viable alternative.
Following the June 2022 Supreme Court ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade, the researchers estimated there were 519,981 rapes associated with 64,565 pregnancies during the four to 18 months after states implemented total abortion bans. Of those pregnancies, an estimated 5,586 occurred in states with exceptions for rape and 58,979 in states with no exceptions.
Of the five states with rape exceptions, strict gestational limits and requirements to report the rape to law enforcement make it harder for most survivors to qualify, the study said. There were 10 or fewer legal abortions per month in the five states with rape exceptions, the study said, indicating that survivors with access to abortion care still cannot receive it in their home state.
“Politicians use the idea of abortion exceptions to provide political cover, but those so-called exceptions don’t actually help pregnant survivors get the care they need,” the study’s lead author Dr. Samuel Dickman said in the release.
Dickman, a researcher at the City University of New York’s Research Foundation and the Chief Medical Officer at Planned Parenthood of Montana, said rape survivors who become pregnant “deserve to make informed, personal decisions about their pregnancy, and state-level abortion bans–even those with exceptions–don’t allow them to do that.”
Behind Texas, the states with the highest totals were Missouri (5,825), Tennessee (4,990), Arkansas (4,660), Oklahoma (4,530), Louisiana (4,290) and Alabama (4,130).
Researchers at Harvard Medical School and The University of California, San Francisco, also carried out the study. The authors analyzed survey and crime report data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the FBI and the Bureau of Justice Statistics. They estimated the numbers of girls and women aged 15-45 who had survived rape that could result in pregnancy in each state after the bans took effect, then applied estimates of the pregnancy rate from rape.
Julian Gill is a medical reporter for the Houston Chronicle. He can be reached at julian.gill@houstonchronicle.com. His wide-ranging work on the medical beat, including a three-part narrative on a COVID-19 lung transplant patient, was recognized at the 2022 Texas Managing Editors awards, where he received top honors in the specialty reporting category and second place in the star reporter of the year category.
In addition to his extensive reporting on COVID, he has written about the effects of the Texas abortion ban, the maternal mortality crisis, and advances in the Texas Medical Center.
He joined the paper in 2018 after two years at the Denton Record-Chronicle, where he covered police and county government. He graduated from the University of North Texas. A San Antonio native, he is a die-hard Spurs fan and avid runner.
I am so inspired by Texas State Rep. Talarico's sermon that argues for women's full personhood instead of the second-class status that the denial of reproductive rights signifies.
I couldn't agree more Rep. Talarico's mother's perspective that "Women can never be free until they belong to themselves."
So much wisdom and clarity here. Thanks to George Hornedo for sending this video and message appearing below.
-Angela Valenzuela
***
Rep. James Talarico, the Texas Legislature’s youngest member, just posted a video of a sermon he gave at his hometown congregation in Texas. Rep. Talarico, currently in ministerial school, argued that Jesus Christ was a radical feminist and the Bible is a pro-choice document.
opposition to voter suppression legislation when he challenged Fox News host Pete Hegseth’s lies in a primetime interview. Earlier this year, his speech to the Texas State Democratic Party went viral again as he called out national Democrats for "spineless talking points & soulless fundraising emails." Beto O’Rourke recently called him "the best politician working in the Texas Legislature right now."
Rep. Talarico is available to talk about his sermon, fighting for a pro-choice Texas, and his role as the youngest member of the Texas State Legislature. Please reach out if you have interest in connecting with Rep. Talarico.
“This summer, more than half our population became second-class citizens.
Every one of our neighbors with a uterus became the property of the State.
And nothing is more un-Christian.” [...]
“The only way we can allow an embryo’s rights to trump a woman’s rights is if we believe a woman is not a full person—which has been the default belief for most of human history.”
“Being Christian and being pro-choice are absolutely consistent because Christianity is a feminist religion.” [...]
“When a mob of men threatened to stone a woman for adultery, Jesus called out their hypocrisy.
When a bleeding woman begged for help in a bustling crowd, Jesus stopped to heal her.
When a young woman wanted to do theology instead of housework, Jesus honored her choice.” [...]
“Jesus famously summed up his teachings into two commandments: love God and love neighbor.
He gave no preconditions, no qualifications, no exceptions.
Love thy neighbor regardless of race, class, or gender.” [...]
“The story of Mary is my favorite story in all of scripture…
We only have Jesus because a woman consented to creating him.
The story of Jesus begins with a single, simple, extraordinary act of feminism.” [...]
Faith is deeply personal. And your beliefs might not be the same as mine.
That's why we have a separation of church and state—no government can keep you from expressing your religion or force you to express theirs.
But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t talk about our faith. [...]
For too long, pro-choice Christians have allowed anti-choice Christians to take over our faith and our country.
On this Sunday before Election Day, we must speak up.
This piece debunks assumptions and stereotypes about the Latina and Latino position on abortion. This concurs with another internal poll by The Hill that I had earlier read titled, Poll: Latinos overwhelmingly oppose abortion bans.
This piece identities an important nuance with Latina/o voters: “...they draw a line on having the government intervene.”
Now doesn't that make abundant sense?
I am in full agreement that dems should not shy away from this and take this issue of abortion rights and health care head on. We should all get out and vote our values lest we devolve into a wretched, dehumanizing world not unlike Gilead in the Handmaid's Tale (see on Hulu), that depicts an authoritarian, patriarchal government with supreme control over women's bodies and reproduction. You can and should view it on Hulu to view in vivid detail exactly what the dystopian vision is of the white, Christian fundamentalist patriarch.
This is not at all what Jesus would want. Diametrically opposite and the polls themselves indicate as much.
So folks, if you've not yet voted, be sure to get out this next Tuesday, Nov. 8th and vote your values. When we vote, we win.
Gabe Vasquez’s latest campaign ad is simple to the point of austere: Black-and-white portraits of women, a melancholic piano score, and a recitation of his opponent’s stance on abortion.
“I will always protect a woman’s right to choose,” Vasquez, a Democrat, vows, drawing a contrast with his Republican opponent, Rep. Yvette Herrell.
Such a commercial could be running in any number of contested congressional seats, where Democrats nationwide are leaning hard into abortion rights as the November election approaches. Most notable in Vasquez’s pitch, however, is that it is airing, in both English and Spanish, in New Mexico’s 2nd District — the most Latino seat in the state with the highest percentage — 47.7% — of Latinos in the nation.
Just as the reversal of Roe vs. Wade has scrambled Democrats’ overall midterm playbook, it has also prompted the party to rethink its long-standing approach with Latino voters. The party is putting the abortion issue at the center, discarding decades of conventional wisdom that it would be a political loser with a group of voters that is overwhelmingly Catholic and seen as socially conservative.
“These incorrect assumptions have lasted for a long time, and they have been incorrect for a long time,” said Gary Segura, dean of UCLA’s public affairs school and a pollster specializing in Latino voters.
The shift comes amid Democratic anxiety and Republican optimism over a small but significant rightward shift among Latino voters as a whole. November will test the two parties’ competing theories — whether abortion will give Democrats a reprieve or the GOP will build on its gains by emphasizing inflation and crime.
“Abortion is not the top issue. The economy is the top issue for voters across America,” said Danielle Alvarez, communications director for the Republican National Committee. “Democrats are talking about this because they don’t have anything else to talk about.”
The specter of the Roe reversal looms large in southern New Mexico from the moment drivers cross the state’s eastern boundary with Texas, which has three variations of abortion bans on the books. Two Planned Parenthood billboards, one in English and another in Spanish, declare “You are entering New Mexico, which supports abortion rights.” With Arizona, its western neighbor, reinstating a near-total ban last month, New Mexico solidified its status as a rare haven for abortion access in the Southwest.
The decision has reshaped politics in the area too, said Ruth Rodriguez, as she took in the wares for sale at the Mimbres Valley Harvest Festival on a recent Saturday. Featuring a pie contest and a petting zoo, it was a festive occasion for this community two hours northwest of Las Cruces; the fair was paused for two years because of COVID-19. But Rodriguez, leaning on her walking stick amid a row of ceramics vendors and voter registration booths, said politics in the area had become more divisive, and without the abortion debate, Democrats “would probably have a big, big problem.”
Rodriguez, a registered Democrat, is Catholic and personally sees abortion as “against God’s will.” But, the 80-year-old retired office worker said, it was not her business to decide if someone else should have the procedure.
“You never know people’s circumstances,” she said. “You say to yourself, ‘OK, I’m not the church. I’m not the judge.’”
Before the high court’s decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization overturned national abortion protections in June, Democratic candidates were more likely to tiptoe around the issue. The assumption, held by strategists in both parties, was that Latinos skewed socially conservative and their religious faith shaped their antiabortion views.
That view misses some key nuances among Latinos like Rodriguez, said Fernand Amandi, a Democratic pollster based in Miami who specializes in the Latino vote.
“Hispanics are conservative on this topic personally, yes,” he said. “But they draw a line on having the government intervene.”
The Dobbs ruling pushed Latino Catholics more firmly in that direction, according to a survey by the Public Religion Research Institute. The poll, taken after the decision was released, found 75% of Latino Catholics said abortion should be legal in all or most cases, compared with 51% who held that view in 2010.
Many Latino opponents of abortion rights now identify as evangelical, the group of Americans most opposed to legalized abortion regardless of race or ethnicity, said Melissa Deckman, chief executive officer of the nonpartisan polling group.
The Dobbs effect has been most pronounced among Latinas, particularly those born in the United States, said Mike Madrid, a California-based GOP strategist and expert on the Latino vote.
“U.S.-born Hispanic women basically feel toward abortion the way that every other woman in the country does,” Madrid said.
Their mobilization had appreciable impact this August in the Kansas referendum on abortion rights. An analysis by TargetSmart, a Democratic analytics group, found Latinos showed up in near record numbers in the state, behind only their turnout for the 2020 presidential election; of that group, 62% were women.
While polling shows support for abortion rights, it is less clear whether the issue will outweigh Republican advantages on the economy and crime.
Sometimes the mixed signals can come from the same survey. An NBC News poll of Hispanic voters found that just 4% ranked it as a top issue this election, far behind matters such as the cost of living. But nearly a quarter of respondents said that a candidate’s stance on abortion could single-handedly determine their support.
Cristina Uribe, director of advocacy and political strategy at the Gender Equity Action Fund, said it is up to abortion rights proponents — and Democratic candidates — to make sure Latinos consider the Dobbs ruling in the voting booth.
“Polling is a thermometer; we need to be a thermostat,” actively pushing the temperature up, Uribe said.
Republicans believe they can capitalize on gains they made in the 2020 election, where President Biden’s lead among Latinos (59%-38%) was smaller than Hillary Clinton’s 2016 margin (66%-28%), according to a detailed study by Pew. In June, Rep. Mayra Flores, a Republican, won a special election for a historically Democratic House seat in south Texas, becoming the first woman born in Mexico to serve in the House.
More Latino GOP candidates filed to run this cycle than ever before, according to the national party’s accounting. The RNC has spent millions opening more than 30 community centers in Texas, Florida, Wisconsin and other key states and congressional districts.
Two of those centers are in Albuquerque and Las Cruces, opposite ends of New Mexico’s sprawling 2nd District. The district used to be a GOP stronghold, covering the rural southern half of the state. Through redistricting, the Democrat-led state legislature excised the conservative-tiltingoil and gas producing region in the east and stretched the seat’s boundaries from the U.S.-Mexico border into parts of Albuquerque. It is now one of the most competitive seats in the country.
At the RNC’s center in Albuquerque, located in a strip mall next to a paleteria selling Mexican ice cream pops, street snacks and aguas frescas, Herrell, the district’s first-term congresswoman, acknowledged the challenging political lean of the new district, which backed Biden by 6 points in 2020.
“Many Hispanics in New Mexico are Democrat — not all,” she said. “But they also are concerned, feeling as if their party may have left them.”
Herrell said the abortion debate was less relevant in her race, given that New Mexico state law protects access to the procedure. (Last year, the state repealed abortion restrictions that were on the books before Roe, in anticipation of the Dobbs ruling.)
“What I’m seeing and hearing in New Mexico when I’m traveling the district is it is converging more to the economy side of things, more about the open border, crime, education,” said Herrell, a 58-year-old former state legislator.
Herrell’s GOP backers have flooded the airwaves with ads hammering her opponent, Vasquez, a former Las Cruces city councilor, as too liberal on taxes and public safety. Recent commercials focus on comments he made in a local TV interview at a 2020 Black Lives Matter rally, where he called for “police reform,” adding “it’s not just about defunding police, it’s about defunding a system.”
The attacks have stung; Vasquez released his own ad featuring a sheriff vouching for his support for law enforcement.
On air, Vasquez and his allies have emphasized Herrell’s support for the Life at Conception Act, legislation introduced in the U.S. House before the Dobbs ruling that would impose a national abortion ban, with no exceptions for rape, incest or protecting the mother’s health. On the ground, Vasquez’s pitch is more varied. In a recent visit to Silver City he told a roomful of Democratic faithful that a win for his party in November is essential for enshrining Roe vs. Wade into law.
“People say, ‘Oh, well, aren’t you a Latino? Aren’t you Catholic?... Aren’t you male?’ And I say, ‘Yeah, but I was raised right!’” he said to a burst of applause and laughs.
Canvassing for votes in a heavily Latino neighborhood in Deming earlier that day, however, Vasquez, 38, spoke about the economy instead of abortion. Conversing largely in Spanish, he spoke about how his family came from Zacatecas, Mexico, and built their lives in New Mexico. His congressional campaign, he said, was about ensuring opportunity for the next generation.
The approach aligns with recommendations from Equis, a political research firm specializing in Latinos that said in a recent memo that Democrats “run the risk of seeming out of touch” if they emphasize abortion ahead of economic concerns.
In Mimbres, Vasquez circulated among the harvest festival crowd before stopping at the cafeteria to introduce himself to some residents and sample the enchiladas. At the end of his table sat Gloria Jaime, who credited Vasquez for showing up to the event, even though the registered Democrat said she’s undecided on her vote.
She had a long list of issues that weighed on her: drugs, the need for more police, the economic prospects for her children. Jaime said abortion was unlikely to sway her.
“That’s a touchy issue,” said the 70-year-old retired school worker from Silver City. She didn’t like hearing politicians talk about it too much.
Still, considering the surge of energy Vasquez has seen from core supporters, he said, abortion is likely to remain central in the campaign’s final weeks.
“We still would have had a shot at this even if Dobbs didn’t happen,” he said in an interview. But, he added, since the June ruling, “I can say that there’s a palpable change on the ground.”
Melanie Mason Melanie Mason is a national political correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, based in Los Angeles. She started with The Times in Washington, D.C., in 2011, covering money and politics, and she also covered state politics and government in Sacramento.
