Mississippi lawmakers send bill that criminalizes abortion-inducing medication to governor

People who distribute, or intend to distribute, abortion-inducing medication in Mississippi could face a criminal charge and up to 10 years in prison if convicted, under a bill lawmakers are sending to Republican Gov. Tate Reeves.

Experts say criminalization could lock up desperate Mississippians and scare doctors away from prescribing these medications in clinical settings for non-abortion purposes, such as stopping postpartum hemorrhaging and easing symptoms of miscarriages.

Lawmakers added restrictions on abortion-inducing drugs to a drug trafficking bill that passed the House 76-38 and the Senate 37-15 on Tuesday. Republicans control both chambers.

“I think we’re going to end up trapping a lot of people into the criminal justice system simply because they want to have autonomy over their own bodies,” said Rep. Zakiya Summers, a Democrat from Jackson, who voted against the bill.

Rep. Celeste Hurst, a Republican from Sandhill, said she introduced this amendment to keep abortion medication, such as mifepristone and misoprostol, from entering Mississippi.

“The intent is to keep doctors from out of state from circumventing our current law,” Hurst told Mississippi Today.

But there is virtually no way for Mississippi to prosecute providers who send abortion pills across state lines, according to Mary Ziegler, an expert on abortion law and a professor at University of California at Davis School of Law. Shield laws in states where abortion is legal protect abortion providers, patients and helpers from out-of-state investigations, lawsuits and prosecutions, Ziegler told Mississippi Today.

“I think lawmakers are imagining this will be primarily used against doctors or drug manufacturers in blue states,” Ziegler said. “But it will be much harder for prosecutors to actually get those people into court than it will be for them to get someone whose partner has these drugs.”

What makes the legislation especially harmful, Ziegler said, is its vagueness. The bill says possession would only be criminal if there were an intent to distribute, but Ziegler expects Mississippians using the drugs for their own purposes could be prosecuted.

Language around clinical settings is also vague. The bill says Mississippi providers would only be prosecuted if they prescribed abortion-inducing medication with the intent to cause an abortion, not in instances where those drugs are prescribed to aid in a miscarriage or stop hemorrhaging. Despite this exemption, the bill is sure to have a chilling effect on health care, Ziegler said.

In both cases, Ziegler said, “the differentiator is intent, which is really, really hard to prove.”

This kind of legislation primarily comes down to the fact that abortion opponents are disappointed that abortions have increased in recent years, Ziegler said.

In 2022, the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, in a Mississippi case, overturned the constitutional protections around the right to abortion. At the time, it was considered a huge victory for the anti-abortion movement. But abortions have paradoxically increased across the nation in the years since then, largely due to increased access to mail-in abortion medication.

“That’s kind of a hollow thing for the state if that happens and then the number of abortions doesn’t go down,” Ziegler said. “It’s like, what did you really accomplish?”

Sen. Daniel Sparks, a Republican from Belmont and one of six lawmakers who hashed out the final details of the legislation, told Mississippi Today he supported the amendment as a way to enforce Mississippi’s abortion ban.

“The state of Mississippi has been pretty clear of where they are about their pro-life position,” Sparks said. “If people are circumventing that through the mail or through other mechanisms, then I think we’re trying to be consistent with what the law is.”

Sen. Bradford Blackmon, a Democrat from Canton who voted against the bill, said it’s “outrageous,” “ridiculous” and “unnecessary” to lump abortion medication in with scheduled drugs and allow the state to enforce imprisonment of one to 10 years for the offense. In the end, Blackmon said, it’s just going to hurt poor women.

“The wealthy Mississippians are still going to be able to go where they want to get abortions,” Blackmon said.

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This story was originally published by Mississippi Today and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.