Texas’ trigger law goes into effect this Thursday.

It’s called a trigger law because it’s “triggered” into effect by the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.  The law targets health care workers who provide abortion care and bans nearly all abortions with few exceptions.  The provisions are extreme: Health care providers found to have violated the law could lose their medical license, be sentenced from five years to life in prison, and fined up to $10,000.

Extreme lawmakers in Texas (and across the country) have made it clear they won’t let up their efforts to take away our rights to make our own decisions about our bodies, our families, and our futures.  Texas’ attorney general already sued the Biden Administration for its executive order protecting doctors providing abortions in emergencies.

Texas is ground zero for these attacks.  That’s why I’m not giving up — frankly, it’s just not an option.  In Congress, I’m working to protect our right to reproductive care and our ability to access it:

• I am an original co-sponsor of the Women’s Health Protection Act (WHPA) to create a statutory right to abortion in all 50 states using the framework of Roe v. Wade, which the House passed in September and again in July.


• I introduced a bill to protect patients traveling out of state for abortion care and the people who are helping them, which the House passed in July.


• I co-sponsored and voted to protect access to contraception — a right only eight Republican members of Congress voted to protect!


• I’m working to make sure everyone can access safe, affordable reproductive health care from providers like Planned Parenthood.

I can take these votes, and we can pass these bills, because we have a pro-choice majority in Congress.  We have to make sure we keep it.

What we are doing in Congress to protect reproductive rights in comparison to what anti-choice lawmakers are doing in Texas  illustrates why elections matter so much.  And why we can’t give up the fight.

Together, we can do anything,