Today’s callous Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization triggers draconian abortion restrictions and the criminalization of immigrant survivors seeking abortion care across the United States. At ASISTA, we are sickened and outraged by this decision, but not surprised.

The grave effects of this racist, misogynistic decision will land heavily on immigrant survivors of gender-based violence. When abortion care is criminalized, it is communities of color that are disproportionately targeted, investigated, and subject to losing their children, losing their livelihoods, and being imprisoned and deported. People without financial resources, transportation, days off work, and the childcare they may need to travel out of state are forced to either remain pregnant and give birth against their will or seek abortion outside of the healthcare system. Immigrant survivors may not have, or have control of, the identification necessary to travel to safely access abortion care. This is what is happening already.

Survivors of gender-based violence face additional needs and barriers related to reproductive care. Domestic violence and sexual assault frequently rob victims of control over their bodies and reproductive lives; in the context of abuse, “choice” is too often an illusion. As ASISTA’s Executive Director, Kirsten Rambo, notes, “Survivors forced to carry unwanted pregnancies to term find it exponentially more difficult to break free from abuse. For immigrant survivors in particular, these challenges are intensified because the fear of deportation is ever present, and now further amplified by the threat of punishment by the state.” ASISTA Legal Policy & Director Cristina Velez further states, “Given that criminalization of immigrant survivors already makes it difficult to get much-needed relief, the grievous impacts of Dobbs cannot be overstated.”

At ASISTA, we will keep fighting back against these cruelties, and we stand in solidarity with all those who continue to pursue dignity, justice, and reproductive freedom for immigrant survivors.

# # #

ASISTA is a national nonprofit organization whose mission is to advance the dignity, rights, and liberty of immigrant survivors of violence.

Our mailing address is:
PO Box 12, Suffield, CT, 06078