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'Direct Result of Trump': Texas Woman Died Because Doctors Feared Abortion Ban
"A vote for Donald Trump and his ghoulish Supreme Court justices and his 'leave it to the states' is a vote for this—people dying in pregnancy," said one rights advocate.
Oct 30, 2024
The case of Josseli Barnica, a 28-year-old Houston resident who arrived at HCA Houston Healthcare Northwest Hospital on September 2, 2021, was devastating—a planned pregnancy that was ending in a miscarriage at 17 weeks—but the treatment she needed was straightforward and recognized as the standard of care by obstetricians around the world, reported ProPublica on Wednesday.
But just one day earlier, the U.S. Supreme Court, stacked with right-wing justices appointed by former President Donald Trump, had allowed a six-week abortion ban to go into effect in Texas, threatening doctors with prosecution and jail time if they acted to help patients like Barnica while a fetal heartbeat was still detectable.
The law pushed doctors at the hospital to delay the care Barnica needed for 40 hours, leaving her vulnerable to the infection that killed her three days after she was finally provided with treatment.
Barnica's case is the latest reported by ProPublica, which is examining the cases of pregnant patients who have died after being denied healthcare because of the abortion bans and restrictions now in effect in 21 states.
Barnica, an immigrant from Honduras who had a young daughter, arrived at HCA Houston Healthcare Northwest after experiencing cramps and bleeding. An ultrasound showed that a miscarriage was taking place, with Barnica's cervix dilated to 8.9 centimeters.
But doctors detected fetal cardiac activity, so they could not provide Barnica with medication to expedite a delivery of the miscarried fetus or a dilation and evacuation procedure to clear the uterus of fetal tissue—both of which would have allowed Barnica to begin healing from the miscarriage and protected her from developing an infection such as sepsis.
Doctors announced on September 5 that they could no longer detect a fetal heartbeat, and gave Barnica medication to help her deliver.
But the damage was done. Barnica experienced increasingly heavy bleeding, and her husband rushed her back to the hospital on September 7. He was shocked to learn that she had died the next day, with "sepsis" involving "products of conception" listed as the cause of death.
ProPublica asked more than a dozen OB-GYNs and maternal-fetal medicine doctors to review Barnica's case, which is still being reviewed by a Texas commission that examines maternal deaths and determines whether they were preventable.
But a four-page summary and timeline of Barnica's hospital visits as well as an autopsy report clearly showed that her death was "preventable," said the experts, who called the case and the hospital's failure to provide standard miscarriage care "horrific" and "egregious."
The hospital told ProPublica it had a responsibility "to be in compliance with applicable state and federal laws and regulations" and did not respond to questions about Barnica's case.
U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) said Wednesday that she was "disgusted and hurt" to learn that Barnica had died because of the state's abortion ban.
"NO PERSON should have to die while losing a child—something that is beyond their control or choice!" said Crockett.
Barnica is one of two Texas women whose abortion ban-related deaths ProPublica is planning to report on this week, as voters across the country head to the polls for early voting ahead of the November 5 election.
Last month, the outlet reported on Amber Nicole Thurman and Candi Miller, two women in Georgia who died because of that state's six-week ban after Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022.
Reproductive rights advocates have emphasized in recent weeks that such cases are the direct result of Trump's selection of right-wing justices for the Supreme Court and the passage of abortion bans across the country—which Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, has said should be determined by the states.
"As more deaths are announced, it's clear that pregnant people in states with abortion bans have no expectation of safety. Josseli Barnica died from a delay in miscarriage care caused by a Texas abortion ban," said Greer Donley, a legal expert who specializes in abortion law.
Indivisible co-founder Ezra Levin called Barnica's death "heartbreaking, preventable, and the direct result of Trump and the MAGA agenda."
Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, has spoken about Thurman's death since ProPublica reported on the case last month, saying, "She should be alive today" at a campaign event. Her campaign has aired an ad featuring the woman's family that ties her death to Trump's anti-abortion rights agenda.
Trump has publicly mentioned Thurman's death only once, to joke that a town hall he held on Fox News would get "better ratings" than a press call Thurman's family was having the same day.
"This is such an unfathomable tragedy, brought forth by Republicans and their pro-life bullshit," said Daily Kos reporter Emily C. Singer of Barnica's story on Wednesday. "Vote like your life depends on it, because it does."
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Judge Strikes Down Georgia's Six-Week Abortion Ban in 'Absolutely Epic Ruling'
"Forcing a woman to carry an unwanted, not-yet-viable fetus to term violates her constitutional rights to liberty and privacy," Fulton County Judge Robert McBurney wrote in his decision.
Sep 30, 2024
Reproductive rights defenders cheered Monday's ruling by a Georgia judge striking down the state's six-week abortion ban as a violation of "a woman's right to control what happens to and within her body," a decision that means the medical procedure will be legal up to approximately 22 weeks of pregnancy.
Fulton County Judge Robert McBurney excoriated the LIFE Act, which was signed into law in 2019 by Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and prohibits abortion care after fetal cardiac activity can be detected. The so-called "fetal heartbeat" law—a medically misleading term—is applicable before many people even know they're pregnant.
Other states including Kentucky, Mississippi, and Ohio passed similar "heartbeat" laws in anticipation of the U.S. Supreme Court's reversal of Roe v. Wade, which occurred in 2022 when the tribunal's right-wing supermajority issued its Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision.
"Women are not some piece of collectively owned community property the disposition of which is decided by majority vote," McBurney wrote in his ruling. "Forcing a woman to carry an unwanted, not-yet-viable fetus to term violates her constitutional rights to liberty and privacy, even taking into consideration whatever bundle of rights the not-yet-viable fetus may have."
"It is not for a legislator, a judge, or a Commander from The Handmaid's Tale to tell these women what to do with their bodies during this period when the fetus cannot survive outside the womb any more so than society could—or should—force them to serve as a human tissue bank or to give up a kidney for the benefit of another," the judge said.
"It is generally men who promote and defend laws like the LIFE Act, the effect of which is to require only women—and, given the socio-economic and demographic evidence presented at trial, primarily poor women, which means in Georgia primarily Black and brown women—to engage in compulsory labor, i.e., the carrying of a pregnancy to term at the government's behest," McBurney added.
As Jessica Valenti noted on her Abortion, Every Day Substack, "the ruling comes just weeks after ProPublica's investigation into the deaths of two women killed by Georgia's abortion ban, Amber Nicole Thurman and Candi Miller.
As NBC Newsreported Monday:
The case stemmed from a lawsuit filed by SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective and other plaintiffs in 2019 soon after Kemp signed it into law. As it faced the legal challenge, in 2022, McBurney ruled that year that the law violated the U.S. Constitution in 2022 and struck it down. The Georgia Supreme Court, however, soon took up the case and allowed it to remain in effect. The case was sent back to McBurney, who found the law in violation of the state's constitution.
SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective executive director Monica Simpson said in a statement that Monday's ruling is "a significant step in the right direction towards achieving reproductive justice in Georgia."
"We are encouraged that a Georgia court has ruled for bodily autonomy," Simpson continued. "At the same time, we can't forget that every day the ban has been in place has been a day too long—and we have felt the dire consequences with the devastating and preventable deaths of Amber Nicole Thurman and Candi Miller."
"For years, Black women have sounded the alarm that abortion bans are deadly," she noted. "While true justice would mean Amber and Candi were still with us today, we will continue to demand accountability to ensure that their lives—and the lives of others who we have yet to learn of—were not lost in vain."
"We know that the fight continues as anti-abortion white supremacists will stop at nothing to control our bodies and attack our liberation," Simpson added. "We are ready for them and will never back down until we achieve reproductive justice: the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, the human right to have children, or not, and raise them in safe and sustainable communities."
Alice Wang, staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights, said that McBurney "has rightfully struck down Georgia's six-week abortion ban as a flagrant violation of Georgia's longstanding and robust right to privacy, restoring access to abortion at a time when too many have been prevented from accessing this critical health care and from deciding what is best for their bodies, health, and family lives."
"For too long, the ban has caused a public health crisis, as evidenced by the testimony plaintiffs presented at trial and devastating stories recently reported about the preventable deaths of Candi Miller and Amber Nicole Thurman," she continued. "Today's ruling is a step toward ensuring that people can access and clinicians can provide critical healthcare without fear of criminalization or stigma."
"This victory demonstrates that when courts faithfully apply constitutional protections for bodily autonomy, laws that restrict access to abortion and force people to continue pregnancies against their will cannot stand," Wang added.
Since the Dobbs ruling, 13 states have passed abortion bans with limited exceptions and 28 states have prohibited the procedure based on gestational duration, according to the Guttmacher Institute.
However, there has been tremendous nationwide pushback against abortion bans, with voters opting to uphold reproductive rights every time the issue appears on state ballots—including in conservative Kansas, Kentucky, Montana, and Ohio.
As many as 10 states could have abortion rights measures on the ballot in this November's election, which at the top of the ticket pits reproductive freedom champion and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris against former Republican President Donald Trump, who has boasted about appointing three right-wing Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe and who critics fear would sign a national abortion ban if one were passed by Congress.
Trump also said he would allow states to monitor people's pregnancies and prosecute anyone who violates an abortion ban.
Kemp's office slammed McBurney's ruling.
"Once again, the will of Georgians and their representatives have been overruled by the personal beliefs of one judge," Garrison Douglas, a spokesperson for the governor, said in a statement. "Protecting the lives of the most vulnerable among us is one of our most sacred responsibilities, and Georgia will continue to be a place where we fight for the lives of the unborn."
Republican Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr is expected to appeal to the state Supreme Court to block Monday's ruling.
"We are prepared to continue fighting this case regardless," the Center for Reproductive Rights vowed on social media, "and we will NOT back down from this fight."
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Trump 'Is the Architect of This Crisis,' Says Harris of Women Killed by Abortion Bans
"He is proud? Proud that women are dying?" said the vice president. "Proud that doctors and nurses could be thrown in prison for administering care?"
Sep 20, 2024
Speaking at a campaign event in Atlanta, Georgia on Friday, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris paid tribute to two women from the state whose deaths have been deemed by health experts as "preventable" and the result of the state's six-week abortion ban.
Amber Nicole Thurman and Candi Miller, said the Democratic presidential candidate, are doubtlessly just two of many people who have died because they couldn't access abortion care since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade—and she blamed former Republican President Donald Trump for their deaths.
"This is a healthcare crisis and Donald Trump is the architect of this crisis," said Harris. "He brags about overturning Roe v. Wade. In his own words, quote, 'I did it and I'm proud to have done it.'"
"He is proud? Proud that women are dying?" she said. "Proud that doctors and nurses could be thrown in prison for administering care? Proud that today, young women have fewer rights than their mothers and grandmothers? How dare he."
Harris shared the stories, reported on this week by ProPublica, of Thurman and Miller, who both died in 2022 after medication abortions did not entirely expel the fetal tissue from their pregnancies.
Thurman spent 20 hours in a hospital growing increasingly sick from sepsis while doctors dangerously delayed performing a dilation and curettage (D&C), a common procedure used for miscarriage and abortion care, due to Georgia's six-week abortion ban. While the ban includes an "exception" to safe the life of a pregnant person, the law's language only makes clear that doctors can perform a D&C for someone having a miscarriage.
The law stopped Miller from seeking healthcare after suffering the same rare complication as Thurman. The mother of three acquired pills for a medication abortion online but did not expel all the fetal tissue and was "bedridden and moaning" for days before her husband found her unresponsive, next to her three-year-old daughter.
Miller's family said she had not sought care "due to the current legislation on pregnancies and abortions."
At the event on Friday, Harris said that "at least two women—and those are only the stories we know—here in the state of Georgia, died because of a Trump abortion ban."
The vice president noted that Trump said last month he plans to vote against Amendment 4 in his home state of Florida—a ballot measure that would outlaw pre-viability abortion bans in the state.
Harris warned voters not to believe the claims by Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), that they don't support making abortion illegal across the nation, a proposal made by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) months after Roe was overturned.
"The stakes are so high," said Harris, "because if he is elected again, I am certain he will sign a national abortion ban."
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