Dueling marches for, and against, Idaho’s abortion ban take over downtown Boise streets

Despite near-freezing temperatures, several hundred people showed up to the steps of the Idaho State Capitol building Saturday morning for the annual Women’s March to protest Idaho’s strict abortion ban.

Three hours later, a few hundred joined the Boise March for Life parade from Julia Davis Park to the steps of the Capitol in support of the abortion policy that bans nearly every rationale for the procedure.

The dueling protests come about a year and a half after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and allowed states to determine their own abortion policies.

Idaho has taken one of the hardest stances against abortion in the nation — banning nearly every case aside from when a pregnant person is at risk of death or in cases of rape or incest that have first been reported to police.

The U.S. Department of Justice sued the state in August 2022, saying that its policy violated the federal Emergency Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA).

EMTALA is a federal law that requires hospitals to treat patients if they are experiencing an emergency medical condition, or transfer them to a different hospital if they don’t have the capability to treat them, according to the National Institutes of Health. The law allows doctors to carry out abortions if the pregnant person’s health is at risk.

Idaho’s policy bans abortion even in emergency medical situations. Physicians who perform an abortion and are not exempt under Idaho’s law can face up to five years in prison, according to prior Idaho Statesman reporting.

The legal case has stalled and resumed the state’s abortion policy several times and has since made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court. On Jan. 5, the Supreme Court allowed the state’s abortion ban to stand.

Since then, Sen. Dan Foreman, R-Viola, introduced a bill to ban abortion even in cases of incest or rape and allow the procedure only if it was certain the pregnant person would die without it, according to prior Statesman reporting.

“We have the most extreme abortion ban in the nation with … absolutely no exception for women’s health or for a non-viable fetus,” said House Minority Leader Ilana Rubel, D-Boise, during the Women’s March. “We’re in a crisis situation.”

Rubel said Republicans in the Idaho Legislature blocked proposed bills that would have helped women, such as expanding Medicaid that would have allowed free contraception to low-income women. She added that Idaho is one of four states in the country that has no public pre-K.

“We had an opportunity to get that pre-K using federal money that wouldn’t have cost us any state dollars,” Rubel said. “But they turned down that money.”

In March, the Legislature passed a budget that excluded $36 million for an ongoing child care stabilization grant funded through federal dollars, according to prior Statesman reporting.

Catherine Glenn Foster, a lawyer and former president of anti-abortion group Americans United for Life, argued for bolstering childcare quality and making it affordable in the state during the March for Life, despite the Legislature’s actions.

“We have to figure out how to articulate what we as a pro-life movement are for because we are pro-life, not anti-child,” Foster said.

Foster said they needed to serve women, babies, refugees and vulnerable and disenfranchised populations through pregnancy resource centers.

“We’re here to talk about the total whole life viewpoint, which includes workforce development, adult education, care for immigrants and refugees and people with diagnoses and elder care,” Foster said. “All of that is pro-life.”

Multiple health systems in Idaho, such as Bonner General Health in Sandpoint, have ceased delivering babies over fears that doctors could be prosecuted, according to prior Statesman reporting.

“Our healthcare system is getting hollowed out,” said Dr. Cynthia Brooke, a speaker at the Women’s March and an obstetrician-gynecologist in Meridian. “Idaho is like a rudderless ship.”

Foster argued the opposite — saying doctors were leaving the state because they were forced to perform abortions by the Biden administration.