“The emerging dynamics of the new post-Roe reality will come to define American women, and American politics, for years to come.”
This month marks two years since Dobbs v. Jackson, the landmark Supreme Court case that overturned the federal right to abortion set by Roe v. Wade. Since the decision left abortion rights up to the states, dozens have criminalized abortion, with many others placing restrictions on the medical procedure. Despite that, support for abortion rights has grown since Roe was overturned: 63 percent of Americans said that abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to an April survey from the nonpartisan Pew Research Center.
In order to figure out how we reckon with this post-Roe world, it’s important to understand how we got to this point — and, more specifically, the years of strategizing and organizing that went into overturning this decision. A new book, The Fall of Roe: The Rise of a New America by New York Times journalists Elizabeth Dias and Lisa Lerer does just that. The book provides a deeply personal and narrative look at the decades-long campaign to restrict reproductive access in the U.S. and takes us from inside secret meetings with Christian activists to abortion clinics to the White House. We reached out to Dias and Lerer, who answered some questions over email about their thought-provoking book and what we should learn from the successful campaign to overturn Roe.
Katie Couric Media: Why do you think pro-choice Americans were caught by surprise by the movement to overturn Roe? Do you see parallels with other issues on which liberals might be underestimating conservatives’ organization and strategy?
Dias/Lerer: The most involved activists were not caught by surprise. Many of them had been watching the growing number of laws restricting abortion for years. But broad swaths of the country were shocked when Roe fell. A majority of Americans supported some form of abortion rights for decades; it was impossible for many to imagine that a right ingrained in American life for two generations could simply disappear.
Part of our goal was to make this complicated story accessible to everyone. It’s been hard to see the big picture amid the chaos of all the developments over the years, so our book puts together the narrative for the first time.
Of course, fundamentally, the issue of abortion is about whether a woman can legally terminate her pregnancy. But for many women, the meaning of abortion is so much bigger. Abortion, for better or worse, has been bound up with the story of American womanhood for the past century. And the emerging dynamics of the new post-Roe reality will come to define American women, and American politics, for years to come.
The book talks about how the anti-abortion movement was losing power in the early 2000s. What happened?
Think back to the rise of President Barack Obama back in 2008, and how different of a path America seemed to be on compared to now. Democrats controlled the White House and there was an abortion rights majority on the Supreme Court. A new feminist movement was boosting women’s empowerment in the culture (remember the “girlboss” era?). Gay marriage was becoming legal in places across the country. And America was becoming more secular, with surveys showing that the number of people identifying with any religion declining.
Activists had been trying for 40 years to overturn Roe, but after Obama was reelected, so many of their hopes seemed lost. A committed core of conservative Christians, driven largely by women, decided to push back. A few years later, they made common cause with Donald J. Trump and put their movement on a bullet train to power. His victory allowed the anti-abortion movement to gain power in statehouses, courts, and, most importantly, the Supreme Court.
What should we learn from the successful effort to overturn Roe?
There’s a lesson about what can be hard to see in the moment, but looking back at seems so obvious. Even as the anti-abortion forces chipped away in the courts and statehouses, many Americans simply did not believe Roe could fall. Their denial was so strong that they could not see what was happening all around them.
No matter what your beliefs are about abortion, the fall of Roe reveals the stakes of staying informed and engaged in your democracy. It shows how a small minority can radically change American life by leveraging political power.
What’s the next step in the fight against abortion, and do you think people are paying enough attention?
Most immediately, there are two cases at the Supreme Court, which will be decided in the coming weeks. In the first case, the same anti-abortion activists who helped gut Roe at the Supreme Court are seeking to restrict access to abortion medication by invalidating the two decades old F.D.A. approval of mifepristone, which is now used in nearly two-thirds of abortions nationwide.
The second case deals with a federal law that requires hospitals to provide emergency care to any patient, including providing abortions for pregnant women facing grave threats to their health. That law conflicts with state abortion bans that prohibit the procedure unless a woman is facing imminent death.
For many conservative Christian activists, the fall of Roe was the beginning, not the end, of their efforts to change American culture. But now, with that spell of denial broken, they face far more public scrutiny. That’s part of the reason why we see such vocal political pushback to proposals like the Alabama court decision limiting access to fertility treatments and statewide abortion bans.
We saw in the midterms that abortion was an important issue at the polls. Do you foresee it playing a big role in the general election?
The fall of Roe scrambled American politics like no other issue in recent memory. For decades, abortion motivated those who opposed the procedure more than voters who supported it. That dynamic wasn’t all that surprising: People fighting to change something are likely to be more energized than those who are happy with the status quo.
But then, practically overnight, the political energy flipped. What we’ve seen since the decision is the emergence of a powerful, new abortion rights coalition of liberal, independent and moderate Republicans that has helped Democrats win races across the country.
For the first time in history, abortion is one of the top issues in the presidential campaign and a centerpiece of President Biden’s re-election campaign. The continued drumbeat of news on the issue — particularly the heart-rending stories of women facing dire medical situations — all but ensure it will remain front and center for voters all the way to Election Day.
Is there anything that gives you hope for the future of reproductive rights in America?
We’re curious to hear how readers answer that question after making their way through our book! Really, it will be up to the readers to shape the country’s future. Our job as journalists is to provide the facts that will help the country understand how Roe fell and what it meant for the nation and American women.
