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Brian: It's the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. Coming up later this hour a deep dive into the shoplifting spike in New York City with James Walsh, who wrote a fascinating, very well-done article in New York Magazine that takes a deep dive and calls it both real and exaggerated. We will illustrate that conversation with clips of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg on the show in November, who spent a good while talking about how they go after shoplifters.

People say, "Oh, DA Bragg is soft on shoplifters." Turns out, I think it's complicated and we're going to talk about that later in the hour and take your phone calls. Then after the eleven o'clock news this morning, part two in our six-part series, the year of Bill and Rudy, how 1993 helped set up the world of 2023. Today, we're going to take a look at Clintonomics, particularly NAFTA and tax increases, and Rudynomics, and how they led to an economic boom in the 90s or did they? Did the economic boom just happen on its own maybe and how all of that help set up the economy of today? That's all coming up.

Yesterday, as you've probably been hearing was the 50th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision and despite the fact that this landmark decision was overturned seven months ago, the March for Life, so-called that annual anti-abortion rally that's been taking place since 1974, the year after Roe went off on Friday as usual in DC, because for anti-abortion activists ending Roe was just the first step. Have you heard this? One month after the fall of Roe, seven states no longer had an abortion clinic, according to research conducted by the Guttmacher Institute. What does that mean?

In human terms, the same research found that in 2020, those seven states accounted for 80,000 abortions. That is presumably 80,000 women this year who wanted abortions who couldn't get access to them, at least in the old way. On the other side, and here's where we'll focus the conversation on this show today, federal agencies are trying to ease the burdens of abortion access by allowing pharmacies to dispense abortion pills and allowing the postal service to ship these pills to people in states where abortion has been outlawed.

Mayor Eric Adams, as we discussed with him on the show last week, is making abortion pills free, including to out-of-towners at several New York City health clinics. Most abortions these days are by pill in the United States. That's the battleground where the battle for access or restriction is increasingly being fought and that's where we will focus this conversation. Shefali Luthra is with us. She is a healthcare reporter at The 19th a nonprofit newsroom covering gender and equity. Shefali, always good to have you. Welcome back to WNYC.

Shefali: Thanks so much for having me.

Brian: Let's start on some of these new regulations and rules on what's called medication abortion. Over the last couple of weeks, just last few weeks, abortion pills have been in the news quite a bit for one thing because the FDA will now allow pharmacies to fill abortion pill prescriptions. Who filled them before?

Shefali: Typically, you had to get these filled through specialty pharmacies. What isn't changing is that you will need a physician's prescription to get a medication abortion which involves two medications mifepristone and misoprostol. Misoprostol has been available at pharmacies already because it is used to treat other conditions. Misoprostol can be much harder to come by. What this change will do is take medication abortions from just the specialty pharmacy which you have to work with in a particular contract with particular expertise, make it available, at least in theory much more broadly.

We know that CVS and Walgreens the two biggest pharmacy chains in the country say that they do want to get certified to begin offering medication abortion pills to have them dispensed to patients who come in with a prescription. We don't know how long it will take for that to happen. We also don't know how widespread adoption will be amongst individual pharmacies within those companies because, for instance, it is very, very unlikely that they will want to offer medication abortion pills in states with abortion bans. The impact is likely to be concentrated in states where abortion remains legal.

Brian: Are states with abortion bans, is it illegal in states with abortion bans to sell or obtain the pills or do the bans just apply to surgical abortions?

Shefali: These bans apply to any form of abortion and medication. Abortion is the most common form of abortion. It is easy to do from home. You can do it safely without going into a clinic and for that reason, many patients prefer it. Any state that has banned abortion within the first trimester or has banned abortion entirely, also outlaws medication abortion.

Brian: You reported that both CVS and Walgreens the nation's two biggest retail pharmacy chains confirmed that they intend to undergo the federal certification process to provide mifepristone, but neither company would specifically say when it will begin or complete that process. Smaller pharmacies could also undergo the certification process, as you report. Is there any indication that they will try to sell them in restrictive states?

Shefali: It is very, very unlikely at best that they will try and sell these in states where abortion is outlawed or heavily restricted. There are reasons for that. There is a lot of political pressure on these large corporations. There's also social pressure and we know that abortion providers have long faced threats of violence. We know that many abortion opponents do intend to turn their focus to pharmacies that will be providing medication abortions.

Brian: Why is this happening now? Is this literally that is the FDA giving regular pharmacies permission to sell abortion pills? Is this literally, Joe Biden v. Greg Abbott and other restriction state governors?

Shefali: I think it's a bit more complicated than that. This had been in the works for a while. In the past, before the COVID-19 pandemic, you could only get medication abortion pills in person from the physician giving you an abortion. That changed because of the COVID pandemic, because there was this push from medical experts to make these pills available through the mail. Through telemedicine, as long as you were able to consult with a doctor virtually. This happened for good reason, of course. People weren't able to safely go to the doctor when we were all staying at home.

That has really paved the way for a broader newer availability of medication abortion pills. This is something that the policymakers had been working on before Roe was overturned, and it's something that medical experts have been calling for even longer.

Brian: Walgreens, by the way, listeners, comes up in both of our first two segments today in the way that we're talking about now with Shefali Luthra from The 19th regarding abortion pills, and the New York Magazine article about shoplifting which the writer of will be on in a little while it's called Fort Walgreens. Walgreens in the news one way and another and another. Listeners, we can take your phone calls on this on access to abortion pills in restrictive states, or if you have a story about how the Dobb's decision which overturned Roe has impacted your life or loved ones, particularly with respect to medication abortion access, but in any way is okay.

212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692 with Shefali Luthra healthcare reporter for The 19th. The 19th by the way, if you don't know it, takes its name from The 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. 212-433-WNYC or tweet your story or comment or question at BrianLehrer. On the legality of this, and again over the battle for abortion pill access, the Justice Department I see issued an opinion just this month, January 4th, that the US postal service could deliver abortion pills across state lines, since senders have no way of knowing whether a recipient is using them legally or illegally.

There's a growing network of covert abortion pill providers now. Let's talk about that Justice Department ruling and the US Postal Service. If a woman lives in Texas, let's say, can they send away to a pharmacy that starts distributing abortion pills in Manhattan or Brooklyn, and is that legal?

Shefali: We know that in a way, this is already happening. What that means in particular is there are providers who operate outside of the United States who will send medication abortion pills to people who ordered them through these networks in states with abortion bans such as Texas. What happens is those are shipped through states in the US where abortion is legal to the states where they are not. I think the legality question gets trickier and trickier. Currently, state abortion laws do not criminalize the pregnant person themself for taking an abortion. We don't know what would happen if someone who helped someone obtain medication abortion pills for instance, then found their way to the state where abortion is illegal, and then if someone attempted to prosecute them under these new state abortion bans. What's really happening is clashing of different laws, state laws, federal protections et cetera, and longer-term many of these questions will be decided in the courts.

Brian: Well, you did an article on whether women themselves are going to be published, one of your recent articles on The 19th. To this point, I want to replay a clip from the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump being asked about this on MSNBC by their host at the time Chris Matthews. This starts with Chris Matthews's question.

Chris Matthew: Do you believe in punishment for abortion? Yes or no as a principle.

Donald Trump: The answer is that there has to be some form of punishment.

Chris Matthew: For the woman?

Donald Trump: Yes, there has to be some form.

Chris Matthew: [unintelligible 00:11:19] 10 years.

Donald Trump: I don't know, that I don't know.

Chris Matthew: Why not?

Donald Trump: I don't know.

Chris Matthew: You take positions and everything else.

Donald Trump: Frankly, I do take positions and everything else. It's a very complicated position.

Brian: Well, that was from 2016. Shefali, I'm sure you know that clip, and that made a lot of people gasp at the time. Of course, a lot of things Trump did made a lot of people gasp and he got elected anyway. He did walk that one back afterwards, which before we talk about the current efforts to prosecute women themselves for getting abortions, maybe the fact that he said that but then walked it back indicates tension within the Republican party over that prospect. Does your reporting touch on that?

Shefali: I think that's precisely correct, and that is what we actually saw this past summer. There was an effort in Louisiana to pass a bill that would've treated abortion as a homicide. Practically, what that would've done is make the people who get abortions liable to murder charges. That didn't pass, and it was in fact very divisive amongst the state's anti-abortion advocates. Some folks say forget but many of the large anti-abortion lobbies worried that it went too far, and even now as we are seeing some states start to introduce similar bills, there is a lot of division and a lot of argument about whether they are ready to take that step of in fact prosecuting pregnant people.

Brian: One of your articles is called Abortion bans don’t prosecute pregnant people. That may be about to change, and then you name names, names of states legislation in Oklahoma, and remarks from the Alabama Attorney General could foreshadow new efforts to punish people who induce their own abortions. How far does that legislation in Oklahoma go?

Shefali: That legislation in Oklahoma in some ways could represent if it passes a Rubicon crossing because it would in fact criminalize pregnant people for taking abortion pills. The lawmaker who is pushing that legislation has in the past expressed skepticism about exceptions that leave pregnant people unable to be charged. It will be really interesting to follow that bill and to follow similar legislation. In Arkansas that is actually undergoing a hearing this week, and see what do the arguments look like. Do they gain more traction now?

There is some back and forth amongst anti-abortion groups as to whether they want to go down this path now or if they want to wait a few years and maybe try and hope that people are paying less attention then because we know that abortion bans are incredibly unpopular. We can also guess with some accuracy and likelihood of success that abortion bans punishing the people who get abortions will be even more unpopular because for so long the anti-abortion movement has really tried to co-op this language of safety and trying to protect the pregnant person's health when these bills suggest that. That actually may not be for everyone the driving motivation.

Brian: I'm sure they'll promise to protect the woman's health when she's in prison. Judy in Brooklyn, you on WNYC with Shefali Luthra from The 19th. Hi Judy.

Judy: Hi. Yes good morning. I simply wanted to point out that I as a woman am not able to receive in the mail a pepper spray which ostensibly by a surprise effect may save my life. However, this legislation allows something to be mailed that will kill alive. I think the juxtaposition of these inconsistencies indicates what kind of state morally we are in. I also want to just share one thing that I learned in elementary school and that is that by being kind to perpetrators we end up being cruel to the victims. You can certainly debate who the victims are, but you understand my viewpoint.

Brian: Yes, so do you think that a pregnant person who takes an abortion pill should be prosecuted and go to prison?

Judy: I don't know. I would really have to check with my rabbi what the view would be, but I think that it is a killing, and I think that any steps that we as individuals, as members of a society and a community make that we join and collaborate in killing, and it is a killing. I'm not really quite sure what category it would fall into because we do have direct killing laws, and of course those that inadvertently when it is done we used to have cities of refuge that people ran to, but I think this might be active killing.

Brian: You said you were going to ask your rabbi, isn't Judaism, and I don't know exactly what branch or what synagogue you're affiliated with, but isn't Judaism largely pro-choice and part of the argument is that the Bible, the Torah, says life begins to birth.

Judy: No, not at birth. No. I do not believe that is the case. There are only certain exceptions that I am aware of that where there is a danger to the mother then the choice is save the mother and other words the implication is that everything else is not okay.

Brian: Judy thank you for your call, I appreciate it and certainly there are divisions within Judaism on that. The reform movement the largest branch of Judaism in the United States is squarely pro-choice, but we'll leave that there for now. Shefali the analogy that she tried to bring up of not being able to buy pepper spray across state lines, but being able to buy this pill which takes a life as she sees it. I could make the opposite analogy using weapons as well.

The Supreme Court with the backing of a lot of people who support abortion bans just recently ruled that if you have a open carry permit or concealed carry permit I should say. A permit to carry a gun in public not just keep one in your own home in Texas that applies to New York, where the state law would outlaw that person carrying a gun in public unless they got a New York permit. These analogies can run in either direction, right?

Shefali: I think that's true. This is where things get interesting and complicated from a legal standpoint in part because there are many state laws that very specifically ban telemedicine for medication abortion. They actively prohibit mailing the pills even when you have a doctor who prescribed them to you, even when you are consulting with the doctor over video chat, over the phone, what have you. That runs exactly contrary to what the FDA says.

There is a legal theory that suggests that the FDA as a representation of the federal government of federal law should Trump state law. We haven't seen that play out in court yet, and it will be very legally interesting at the least to see what happens if the Biden administration ever does attempt to challenge one of these state telemedicine abortion bans making this very argument.

Brian: If they don't prosecute women who get abortion pills and then take them in the restrictive states, and you've been talking about how that's a Rubicon that may soon be crossed and some states may start doing that if they don't in those cases, what would they try to do? Go to Brooklyn and arrest a pharmacist?

Shefali: These are really good questions that we don't have answers to, but I have definitely spoken to physicians who are afraid of being in a state within an abortion ban for a few hours to a night, because what if someone finds them then and tries to charge them under state laws that they, in theory, have violated from their home states? Some states with abortion rights protected have also tried to pass laws that shield their providers. These are called shield laws. New York is actually weighing some shield laws this year in the legislature, but what we have again, is state laws running up against state laws, and we don't know what will happen when they go against each other in court.

Brian: Few listeners want to talk back to the previous caller one on Twitter about the reason for the pepper spray through the mail ban rights. Pepper spray can explode, especially if shipped on a plane. There is no discrepancy. Another one, similarly tweets bear spray, a pepper spray cannot be taken on planes for safety reasons they easily explode. Pills are not a similar safety problem, and Nicki in Harlem wants to respond to another thing that that caller said. Nikki, you're on WNYC, hello.

Nikki: Hi, Brian. I really don't understand how she equates the killing with this legality of transporting pepper spray. How come anti-abortion both never talk about the death penalty? Those are people that we are killing. Some of them are innocent, and yet--

Brian: Well, some people do. The Catholic church takes the position against abortion and against the death penalty, for example.

Nikki: This is not a vocal opposition it seems because we don't hear too much about it, and also, it's not a baby. It's a collection of cells that will come together and there's the embryonic phase, it comes a fetus, and then eventually it will become a baby. When you have an abortion you're stopping that process. I think a lot of people didn't pay attention in biology class.

Brian: Thank you very much, and I guess different people have different interpretations. Shefali, this must come up in your reporting where some people believe that it's a person at the moment of conception, and some people believe it's a collection of cells. Does science actually have an answer?

Shefali: I think that's where it really does come down to interpretation as you're right, and this is something that we do here in state houses during floor debates over legislation on where abortion should be regulated. Many people who support bans cite their faith as a reason. Many people who protest outside abortion clinics cite their faith as an argument there, but what I will note, which I think is really interesting, is if we look at the polling people of all faiths and people of the Catholic faith, for instance, do not support total abortion bans, that is simply not where most voters are.

I think that's an interesting nuance that perhaps separates many rank-and-file members of religious organizations from leadership and from other members of their congregations. Even in Kentucky, I believe it is one in three voters who identified as evangelical voters came out in favor of abortion rights when looking at that ballot initiative this November. What all this tells us is that people's relationship to faith and to abortion is really complicated and perhaps more nuanced than our top-line political discourse might suggest.

Brian: By the way, a Catholic listener on the topic of the Catholic church opposing both abortions and the death penalty rights, though they don't organize huge marches against the death penalty pointing out that discrepancy. I want to play a clip of Mayor Eric Adams on this show last week. He came on in conjunction with his announcement that 4 New York City sexual health clinics will start offering free abortion pills, and you can get them, even if you come from out of state, you don't have to be a New York City resident.

You don't have to show ID, I don't believe and I asked him if part of the goal of expanding abortion pill access to city-run clinics is to help expand abortion access for people not just in New York, but from states where it is limited post Roe v. Wade Overturning. Here's what he said.

Mayor Eric Adams: It is not a primary goal to ensure a woman in this state have whatever is available for them for their healthcare needs, but at the same time we wanted to send a message to the woman of this country because our relationship with women in this country is not limited to the geographical boundaries of New York State. Aunties and nieces that are all over this country, and I wanted to make sure that we send a message that no matter who you are, that you have a right to be in control of your body in New York State is going to be a leading voice on that.

Brian: Shefali in Oklahoma, are they going to indict Mayor Eric Adams as an accessory to murder?

Shefali: I would be surprised if that happened. I think what the mayor's policy does make me think about is how many people are actually able to make that journey to New York to begin with. We know that countless people are traveling out of state right now for abortions. We also know that those journeys are really expensive. The latest data, this came out in October and it looked at comparing April, so before the Dobbs decision to August after the Dobbs decision, there was an increase in abortions performed in New York. It was an increase of about 12%, and that's substantial.

It means that many people are coming to New York to get abortions, that many of them could access abortions through this initiative, but it's also nowhere near the top. The states where the most people are traveling by percentage are North Carolina and Kansas, and that makes sense when you think about geographically what is easiest to get to what might cost the least to get to, but what it also tells us is that perhaps the initiatives with the most impact may not be in New York, but maybe in states like those.

Brian: Kansas and North Carolina, we should look at them as legal states in a sea of restrictionist states.

Shefali: I think that is exactly how the abortion providers there feel.

Brian: Do you need a prescription from a doctor to send away for an abortion pill under this new FDA ruling that regular pharmacies like Walgreens and CVS can offer them?

Shefali: You do, and that is, again, a source of debate amongst some abortion rights, commentators, experts, advocates, et cetera, but that is currently where the policy stands. You need a physician to approve this for you. You need a physician to talk you through how to take it and to be available to you afterward. In case you have any questions about the after-effects, which to be clear, these pills are incredibly safe and incredibly effective.

Brian: Where do you see this battle over access to medication abortion going over the next few months? It seems like this is a very fast-moving area of law and politics.

Shefali: I think this is arguably the number one issue for the anti-abortion movement. We have heard from so many people who oppose abortion, who have really been advocates for these abortion bans, feeling really frustrated that people who live in states where abortion is outlawed are able to access these pills, whether that is through mail or through travel or what have you. They're going to be looking to see what are the ways that states can make it harder to access medication abortion pills.

Some have told me that they would really like to see more federal involvement and prosecution from attorneys general on the state and federal levels. We know that under the current administration and in the current Congress, federal action to make abortion harder to access feels very unlikely. The Biden administration has made it clear they support access to an abortion, but what this does mean is we can expect more legislation in states. We can expect more remarks from attorneys general on the state level about how they want to make medication abortion harder to attain, and this is very likely to be an issue of the 2024 Republican primary.

Brian: On this day, after the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, in about 7 months since its demise, we thank Shefali Luthra a healthcare reporter at The 19th, the newsroom dedicated to covering politics and policy through a gender equity lens. We always appreciate when you come on Shefali. Thanks a lot.

Shefali: Thank you so much.

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