A small city in central Texas granted a “pop-up abortion information store” permission to tell women how to order abortion pills despite a nominal ban on distributing the substances in the state, as revealed in permits obtained by The Sentinel via public records request.
Mayday, a nonprofit entity which enables women across the nation to obtain abortion pills through “international community networks and online pill providers,” temporarily opened the store in Bastrop, Texas, a small town southeast of Austin, at the end of last week, as noted in a previous report from The Sentinel. Individuals who visited the store saw signage on how they could obtain “birth control, emergency contraception, and abortion pills wherever they reside.”
The signage permits obtained by The Sentinel show that Mayday informed officials that a sign posted on the left window of the storefront would read “abortion pills by mail” and direct users toward the Mayday website. Another sign posted on the right window would read “even in Texas, you can still get an abortion pill,” while a third sign posted on the door would inform mothers that abortion pills are available “by mail” in all fifty states and “even in Texas.”
The “pop-up abortion information store” event occurred at the Painted Porch Bookshop, a bookstore owned by podcast host and journalist Ryan Holiday. The location hosted a drag queen story hour event last summer which provoked backlash from community members.
Mayday previously confirmed to The Sentinel that their activities were legal in the state of Texas and that the entity obtained permits from officials in Bastrop. The Sentinel also contacted the office of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to inquire about the legality of the “abortion store” but has not received a response.
Current law in Texas, which bans manufacturers and physicians from distributing abortion pills through the mail, nevertheless states that a woman “on whom a drug-induced abortion” is performed cannot be held “criminally liable for the violation.” The procedure involves a mother taking a series of two substances called mifepristone and misoprostol: the former causes the death of her baby and the latter induces a premature delivery.
Representative Stan Gerdes, a Republican who represents Bastrop in the Texas House, sponsored legislation earlier this year calling on prosecutors to “investigate and prosecute abortion funds and each of their donors for aiding or abetting criminal abortion” should they “provide information on how to obtain an abortion-inducing drug.” The bill, however, does not prohibit “conduct engaged in by a pregnant woman who aborts or attempts to abort the woman's unborn child” and clarifies that criminal penalties would “not apply to a pregnant woman on whom an elective abortion is performed or attempted.”
The Sentinel contacted Gerdes about the legislation in light of the “abortion store” event and asked about the exemptions for women who take abortion pills. This article will be updated with any response.
Other conservative states, many of which have heavily regulated surgical abortion centers after the overturn of Roe v. Wade, do not allow officials to prosecute mothers for the murder of their preborn children, even if the mothers willfully choose to order the pills without assistance or coercion from any other party. Oklahoma, for example, expressly bans the “charging or conviction of a woman with any criminal offense in the death of her own unborn child,” while Tennessee makes explicit that “the pregnant woman upon whom an abortion is performed or attempted” cannot be subjected to “criminal conviction or penalty.”
