The shocking headlines out of Alabama have made it clear – extremists aren’t stopping at abortion.

They’re trying to take away IVF and birth control. No matter where you live, if you have extremists in your state government, your rights are at risk right now. If Republicans gain control of the federal government, ALL of our rights are at risk.

Here’s what extremists are actually doing:

• 125 Republicans in the U.S. House, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, are sponsors of the Life at Conception Act, which seeks to recognize a fertilized egg as a person and would severely restrict or outlaw IVF. 
• U.S. Senate Republicans blocked Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s bill to federally protect IVF.
• In his concurring opinion overturning Roe, Clarence Thomas suggested that contraception would be next.
• 195 Republicans in Congress voted against The Right to Contraception in 2022.
• Republican-dominated state legislatures have systematically blocked The Right to Contraception from becoming law. In Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Wisconsin, Republicans have not even allowed the bills to be heard in committees. In Nevada, Republican Governor Lombardo vetoed it.

We’re telling every politician who threatens our rights to IVF and birth control that we’re not falling for their lies.

For many families, IVF is their only option to have kids, but now it’s at risk all across the country.

What is going on with Alabama?

In an unprecedented ruling, Alabama’s Supreme Court has ruled that frozen embryos are “children” and destroying them can bring wrongful death charges.

Many families depend on in-vitro fertilization (IVF) to get pregnant. During IVF, embryos are sometimes frozen to improve their eventual transfer and implantation or to save them for future use. Embryos that are not viable are often discarded since implanting them would not result in a pregnancy.  

The Alabama court’s ruling could change all of that. Fertility specialists could now be subject to massive liability, and IVF patients could be forced to store unused embryos forever or feel pressure to implant them. Worse, if this ruling is allowed to stand, it could impact future reproductive rights legislation and IVF, both in and out of Alabama.

Why was an IVF bill blocked?

After the court ruling in Alabama, a lot of Republican politicians rushed to claim support for IVF. Unfortunately, it was just words. 

When Senator Tammy Duckworth introduced The Access to Family Building Act in March of 2024 to protect IVF and other assisted reproductive technology (ART) throughout the country, Republicans blocked it. Instead of allowing the legislation to pass by unanimous consent, Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith objected, effectively killing the bill. As a result, there is currently no federal legal protection for IVF or ART. 

In 2023, 125 Republican members of the House, including Speaker Mike Johnson, sponsored The Life at Conception Act, which would recognize fertilized eggs as full humans, with the same legal rights as a living person. This is also known as “fetal personhood” and  would severely restrict, if not outlaw access to IVF, as well as abortion.

What is IVF?

IVF, which stands for in-vitro fertilization, works by using a combination of medicines and surgical procedures to help sperm fertilize an egg, and help the fertilized egg implant in the uterus. It basically replicates natural reproduction and is used to help people get pregnant who have struggled with infertility.

The process often starts with medication that makes several eggs mature and ready for fertilization. Then the doctor takes the eggs out of the body and mixes them with sperm in a lab, to help the sperm fertilize the eggs. Once there are fertilized eggs, doctors see which ones are viable embryos. For many people going through IVF, there are non-viable embryos that are usually discarded. It’s important to remember that these embryos cannot become a human child. 

When the doctor has identified the viable embryos, they will put one or more embryos directly into the uterus. Pregnancy only happens if any of the embryos implant in the lining of the uterus.

Keep in mind that the chance of having a full term, normal birth weight baby from IVF is about 21 percent for women younger than 35, 17 percent for women 35 to 37 years old, and the rate continues to drop off with age.

IVF can be difficult physically and emotionally. It’s also very expensive, and often not covered by insurance. Anyone who goes through IVF really wants to have a child – and no lawmaker should deny them that.

What is fetal personhood?

Fetal personhood is the concept that a fetus has the same legal rights as a person—and that life begins at the time of conception. Fetal personhood is not a new idea. It has been a longtime goal of the anti-abortion movement in American politics that really gained traction in the 1980s and 90s. Proponents of fetal personhood believe that a fetus, or in some cases even embryos, should have the same rights as a living child. 

In the Alabama Supreme Court ruling, the court even went so far as to say that frozen embryos that have not yet been implanted and might not even be viable, had the same rights as a living person. 

The overturn of Roe v. Wade opened the door for fetal personhood laws to move forward, and the Alabama Supreme Court decision is just one more step in this movement to completely ban IVF, contraception, and abortion.

What are the implications of fetal personhood on abortion and reproductive care?

Fetal personhood laws can be used to punish people who get an abortion or naturally miscarry a pregnancy. In fact, these laws have already been used in some states to criminally charge pregnant women. 

For almost 50 years, Roe v. Wade protected our constitutional right to an abortion, and therefore restricted fetal personhood laws. The Dobbs decision in 2022 overturned the federal right to an abortion and opened the door for those laws, which now exist in one third of states. Much like the trigger bans we saw across the country, these laws were ready to go into effect immediately following the Dobbs decision. Some states started proposing fetal personhood laws as early as 2008, in preparation for an eventual reversal of Roe. 

Fetal personhood opens up a lot of legal complications. There are questions about whether people will be charged with homicide if they perform or obtain an abortion, or even assist in miscarriage care. We have already witnessed several states where doctors are afraid to provide full care to a pregnant woman due to laws that criminalize abortion. Fetal personhood laws will only add to these fears and further limit what doctors can do to treat a pregnant woman, jeopardizing their health and lives. 

In short, fetal personhood laws are an attempt by the anti-abortion movement to control not just abortion, but all means of reproductive choices and family planning including contraception and IVF. Once a fetus is granted the full legal status of a person, the legal rights of pregnant people come into question. A pregnant woman may lose (or in some cases, already has lost) the right to control what happens to their body during their pregnancy.

What are the implications of fetal personhood and embryo classification on IVF?

Fetal personhood laws could severely limit the IVF process because doctors could no longer discard non-viable embryos or freeze embryos. Both of these steps are vital to the success of the IVF process. Forcing women to go through with the implantation of non-viable embryos would be a cruel medical practice that would not result in successful pregnancies, but would impact the health of the women and prolong the IVF process.  

Furthermore, if embryos cannot be discarded, there is also the question of what couples do with them once they are done having children. Many couples who have gone through IVF have unused embryos that are frozen and stored at great personal expense. There are now fears that couples could be forced to use these embryos, and would not be able to decide if they want to keep them frozen, discard them, or donate them to science.

What is the legal status of embryos (personal property or personhood) in Alabama?

Prior to the Alabama Supreme Court ruling, embryos were considered property. When the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that parents could sue over the destruction of their embryos it stated that “Unborn children are ‘children’ … without exception based on developmental stage, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics,” and went so far as to call them “extrauterine children.” This ruling gives embryos the same rights as a child in the state of Alabama.

How will the Alabama ruling affect other states?

Immediately following the ruling out of Alabama, there were fears that other states with extremist politicians would follow suit. 

Even before the ruling in Alabama four states already had fetal personhood on the books. In Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, and South Carolina, pregnant and postpartum women have already been criminally charged due to drug use during their pregnancies.   

Following the ruling in Alabama, legislators in 14 additional states are considering similar fetal personhood laws, despite the outpouring of concern over how this would impact IVF. These laws are often meant to be vague, giving legislators the ability to claim they aren’t stopping IVF, but that’s exactly what the laws would do.

IVF and the GOP

Let’s be clear, the majority of Republican politicians do not support access to IVF. They just can’t say it openly because they know that the majority of Americans (across party lines) support IVF. 

• 125 Republicans in the U.S. House, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, are sponsors of the Life at Conception Act, which seeks to recognize a fertilized egg as a person and would severely restrict or outlaw IVF.
• U.S. Senate Republicans blocked Senator Tammy Duckworth’s bill to federally protect IVF.
• Members of the Freedom Caucus in the House called IVF “morally reprehensible” after the Veterans Administration added protections for IVF services to military and veteran families. 

Despite extremist politicians trying to talk around the issue, their actions tell us that they do not think families should have access to IVF and they are unwilling to protect our right to IVF.

The GOP and Birth Control

When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in his concurring opinion that the court “should reconsider” past decisions. This includes Griswold v. Connecticut, which protects the right to use contraception. 

Republicans in Congress and state legislatures have also expressed opposition to our right to contraception:

• In 2022 195 Republicans in Congress voted against the Right to Contraception Act. 
• Republican-dominated state legislatures have systematically blocked The Right to Contraception from becoming law. In Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Mississippi, North Carolina and Wisconsin, Republicans have not even allowed the bills to be heard in committees. In Nevada, Republican Governor Lombardo vetoed the bill. In Virginia, Governor Younkin will likely veto a bipartisan bill protecting contraception.   

When politicians tell us they support contraception, we must pay close attention to their actions. In fact, Republican politicians have systematically shown us how they really feel about birth control. The truth is, our right to all types of reproductive choices and family planning are at risk.