What It’s Like to Be A Pro-Choice Activist in an Anti-Abortion State
Kierra Johnson is also frustrated at the way red states get written off in conversations about abortion. Johnson, who is originally from Georgia, is the Executive Director of Urge, an organization that gets young people involved with activism around reproductive and gender justice, particularly in Midwestern and Southern states. “Unfortunately, there are a lot of negative misconceptions about who Southerners are: We need to be saved, we are somehow backwards, we are a lost cause,” Johnson said. “The reality is that the South has a long history of powerful organizing. We need people who do this work not despite where they are from, but precisely because of where they are from.”
Congress members casually compare abortion to slavery, black genocide, and killing puppies
Later, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) invoked the Supreme Court’s Dred Scott decision to suggest — as many Republicans and conservatives often do — that abortion is like slavery because women treat fetuses like “property.” Johnson’s response to that idea, which again sparked applause from the room, was: “It’s interesting that we’re bringing up slavery in this space. When you own somebody’s decision-making, you own them.” “We are not simple-minded. We are not being duped.” Johnson continued. “The majority of women who have abortions are parents. They care. They care about their families.”
The Grassroots Activists Who Made Affordable Abortion An Election Issue
“It’s been an honor and a pleasure to witness young women of color take the reins of reproductive rights organizations in the last twenty years,” Johnson said. “It’s the most visibility of women of color in leadership positions in decades.” Johnson, who as been at URGE for 17 years, said that the real push to build political power to repeal Hyde began around six years ago. She and other leaders in the movement expanded their outreach, connecting to the generation of people most affected who had been ignored. “People were like ‘Damn, they are finally paying attention to me,’” she said. “And other people were shocked, they had no idea the government was using the Hyde Amendment to deny women health care because they were poor.”
How Kierra Johnson Is Ensuring Young Women Have A Say In What Happens To Their Bodies
Johnson and URGE will continue on with the fight, to ensure that women and young people have agency and power, to move forward other policies that affirm sexual health, reproductive rights, and gender justice. “Ultimately, this ruling is not just about abortion,” she says. “It’s a decision that impacts how we see women as valuable people with the maturity and the ability to make decisions for themselves.”
‘These laws will fall’: Abortion rights regain lost ground with Supreme Court
On Monday morning Kierra Johnson stood before the Supreme Court. The summer sun reflected off the white marble steps. She’d already begun to sweat, and it was only 7:30 a.m. Johnson, executive director of the nonprofit organization Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity (URGE), had gathered there with several staff members to learn the fate of Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, the most pivotal abortion rights case in decades. They were not alone. “That victory — my whole body felt it,” says Johnson, who has worked in reproductive rights for the past 17 years. “There was dancing, crying, hugging, shouting, jumping. Everybody was at that moment an everyday human being just happy to have our humanity affirmed.”
Why the Supreme Court Abortion Clinic Ruling Was a Win for Black Women
As a Black woman who’s been working for reproductive justice for 17 years, this felt like a different kind of victory party, one that equally celebrated this historic moment and recognized how far we have to go make sure the right to abortion is a reality for each of us. I was proud to see Black women represented and representing: Black women from the South, Black Latinas, Black youth, Black women interns, students, and executive directors alike turned up to show support for the issue of abortion.
What Abortion Has to Do with the Minimum Wage
“When we think about Medicaid, the only battle isn’t around abortion access,” said URGE’s Johnson. While Medicaid doesn’t cover abortion, it also doesn’t always cover the costs of an additional child, leaving some people with an unplanned pregnancy unable to afford either option. Expanding eligibility, then, is an area where pro-choice activists and others might find common ground.
It’s Time to Talk about How Economic Security Affects Reproductive Health Access
All too often, we talk about the political aspects of the right to abortion, but we don’t talk enough about the links between access to abortion and economic security. That could change. On April 28, we will join members of Congress and leaders from organizations around the nation — including labor, economic justice, women’s rights and reproductive rights groups — for the first conversation on Capitol Hill about the connection between financial autonomy, economic security and the right to choose.
Why Students Are Declaring They Are #AbortionPositive
“While anti-abortion activists use gruesome and insensitive imagery to reach college students, we believe an empowering, honest, abortion-positive approach is more motivating to young people,” URGE Executive Director Kierra Johnson said in a statement. “Young people support access to abortion, and they are energized to start turning back the tide of anti-choice restrictions on our bodies and our choices.”
Kansas pro-choice advocates seek repeal of telemedicine abortion ban
Kansas has been eroding reproductive health care access for several years, even leading the nation in the number of abortion restrictions passed,” said Erendira Jimenez, an URGE student leader at Wichita State University. “We came to Topeka today to say that we have had enough of this extreme political agenda.
