Elizabeth Tobin-Tyler on "Abortion Rights and the Child Welfare System: How Dobbs Exacerbates Existing Racial Inequities and Further Traumatizes Black Families"

Elizabeth Tobin-Tyler published Abortion Rights and the Child Welfare System: How Dobbs Exacerbates Existing Racial Inequities and Further Traumatizes Black Families in Volume 51 of the Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics. The conclusion is excerpted below: 

 

The Dobbs decision has profound implications for women, children, families and communities in states that have banned or severely restricted access. In states with large Black populations that have banned abortion and a long legacy of racial injustice and parsimonious safety nets for low-income families, the consequences will be most dire. With abortion outlawed, state lawmakers and child welfare system agency administrators have to decide if they will act to support family health and well-being or continue punitive policies that tear families apart based on poverty and deprivation. So far, state policymakers seem to be either ignoring the post-Dobbs consequences for families altogether or proposing policy solutions that will only exacerbate existing injustices — such as expanding the foster care system as proposed by the Mississippi House Speaker. With the Supreme Court and federal and state policymakers undermining reproductive and racial justice, advocates will be more vital than ever in helping to mitigate the harms, particularly to Black families, that are coming.