Abortion-rights group convinces Texas lawmakers to amend bill that could have opened women to prosecution

AUSTIN – After intense lobbying from abortion-rights advocates, Texas lawmakers appear to be closing a loophole in a bill aimed at clarifying when doctors can legally perform abortions. That loophole could have allowed authorities to prosecute women who get an abortion out of state along anyone who assists them in obtaining the procedure, critics maintain.

During a Tuesday press conference, members of the group Free & Just, said the Republican lawmakers behind the proposal agreed to amend it so it couldn’t be used to target pregnant people for criminal prosecution. The organization is made up of plaintiffs in the Zurawski v. Texas case, in which women who experienced severe pregnancy complications sued Texas to seek clarification on when abortions are permissible under state law.

“We are cautiously optimistic that once we see the language, and that hopefully when it passes, that this is a step in the right direction,” Texas abortion advocate Kaitlyn Kash said during a Tuesday press conference in Austin. “We still have a long way to go to ensure that what happened to me and my family and my friends and their families does not continue to happen.”

Kash, who was forced to carry her dead fetus for weeks as a result of the Texas abortion ban, is one of dozens of women who argue they have been denied necessary medical care due to the law.

Under Texas’s current abortion ban, doctors can only perform the procedure if the patient’s life is at risk. However, critics argue that the wording of the law is deliberately vague, causing doctors to fear prison time, massive fines and loss of their medical license. So far, at least three Texas women have died as a result of the confusion.

Authored by Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes, an East Texas anti-abortion crusader, Senate Bill 31 purportedly sought to clarify language in the Texas abortion ban to help medical professionals better understand when the procedure can be performed without exposing them to possible criminal charges.

However, critics including Free & Just warned the language in SB 31 and its companion bill, House Resolution 44, could open a pandora’s box by reviving Texas’s 1925 abortion ban, which allows women who receive an out-of-state abortion to be criminally prosecuted.

“From their very public actions over the last three years, we simply cannot trust that state actors will not use that opening to criminalize us and our families for the health care choices that are best for us,” plaintiffs from Zurawski v. Texas wrote in an April 11 letter to lawmakers.

After lobbying lawmakers Tuesday, Kash and other plaintiffs told reporters their concerns didn’t fall upon deaf ears — at least, not this time. She credited media coverage of the effects of the Texas abortion ban on their lobbying success.

“To be quite honest, people don’t want to see women dying, and so unfortunately, it took stories like Amanda [Zurawski’s] and the women that passed away to have an impact,” she added.

Zurawski, who attended Tuesday’s press conference, went into septic shock twice and was left with a permanently closed fallopian tube after doctors refused to perform an abortion on her fetus. The fetus suffered a preterm pre-labor rupture of membranes, but because it had a detectable heartbeat, physicians feared being criminally prosecuted.

“I am encouraged today,” Zurawski said. “When I was fighting for my life in the hospital for three days, I was terrified. My family was terrified, and to think that a family going through what we went through would also have to fear going to jail on top of potentially losing their child, their wife, their daughter is absolutely terrifying.”

Although Tuesday appeared to bring a victory for Texas abortion-rights advocates, the Free & Just members warned there’s still plenty of work to be done — and plenty of dystopian bills to fight. 

For example, House Bill 5510 — filed by Rep. Jeff Leach, R-Plano — would allow the state to prosecute online abortion pill providers and shut down websites that share information about abortion medication. The House State Affairs Committee is set to hear that proposal on Friday.

Meanwhile, Senate Bill 1976, also authored by Hughes, would allow the state to conduct quarterly testing of wastewater to detect chemicals from abortion pills. 

‘”What every Texan needs to know is that your vote really matters, and we need to be voting for people who fight for safe pregnancies in Texas,” said Melanie Rummel, another Texas woman forced to seek an out-of-state abortion due to pregnancy complications. “No matter what someone believes personally, we have to fight for abortion access because it is essential healthcare.”

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This article appears in Apr 16-29, 2025.