What if they passed a law that effectively nullified Roe v Wade and no one reacted? And by “no one”, I mean the businesses that had previously stood up for abortion rights in 2019 when multiple state legislatures were trying to pass other onerous restrictions?
In 2019, almost 200 corporate leaders stood up for abortion rights. Amid a rash of antiabortion legislation throughout the U.S. South, they said: no more. Abortion restrictions are bad for business.
On Wednesday, Texas enacted an abortion ban stricter than the ones that proliferated two years ago, thanks to its unprecedented “bounty hunting” clause that allows private citizens to sue anyone who “aids and abets” an abortion conducted after six weeks of pregnancy. And yet this time around, the business backlash is missing.
“Their silence is shameful,” says Shelley Alpern, director of shareholder advocacy for Rhia Ventures who has worked to galvanize companies around reproductive rights. “Their very integrity is at stake.”
So why aren’t companies speaking up?
[…]
One reason companies have stayed silent is that—like their employees—firms have a lot on their plate in 2021. Their workforces are scattered remotely; the Delta variant is delaying return-to-office plans; COVID cases continue to rise. News about abortion bans didn’t dominate the news cycle leading up to this law in a way that pressured corporate leaders to respond. Texas’s abortion ban going into effect at midnight Wednesday—and the Supreme Court’s official decision not to intervene almost 24 hours later—took many people by surprise. “The overall level of corporate awareness around Texas is very slim,” says Jen Stark, senior director of corporate strategy for the Tara Health Foundation, an organization that advocates for gender equity and access to reproductive health care. “Some of this is pure bandwidth and capacity.”
But now that the Texas law is in effect, will companies finally speak up? Fortune reached out to about a dozen companies—from startups to Fortune 500 businesses—with a significant employee presence in Texas, including those that moved operations to the state over the past year. Most did not respond to a request for comment.
Bumble, the dating app business based in Austin, declined to comment but posted on Instagram that the company had created a “relief fund” to support people who seek abortions in Texas amid what the company called a “regressive law.” Bumble, led by CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd, is known for its outspokenness on issues of gender equity and has engaged in the Texas political process in the past, lobbying for legislation to penalize the unsolicited sending of lewd images.
The strongest Texas corporate response came from dating app competitor Match Group, which is headquartered in Dallas. Tinder, a Match company, signed the 2019 letter advocating against abortion restrictions. Match CEO Shar Dubey told employees on Wednesday that she would “set up a fund to ensure that if any of our Texas-based employees or a dependent find themselves impacted by this legislation and need to seek care outside of Texas, the fund will help cover the additional costs incurred.”
“The company generally does not take political stands unless it is relevant to our business,” Dubey wrote in a note to employees. “But in this instance, I personally, as a woman in Texas, could not keep silent.”
Employers are engaged on issues of gender equity; the challenge ahead for reproductive rights activists is to get companies to see abortion rights as part of their gender equity commitments. That’s a view already shared by large shares of their workforces; according to a new survey conducted in August by research firm PerryUndem, two-thirds of the college-educated workforce says Texas’s SB 8 would discourage them from taking a job in the state.
Companies that spoke out in favor of abortion rights in 2019 said that restricting access “threatens the health, independence, and economic stability of our employees and customers.”
Stark, of Tara Health, rallied companies to sign the 2019 letter on abortion bans but has had mixed success in the years since getting businesses to speak up for reproductive rights at subsequent junctures. “If they don’t feel the squeeze, they try to run out the clock as long as they can,” Stark said of the challenges of getting companies to join these efforts.
There’s a Times story along the same lines. Companies respond to pressure, and right now they’re not feeling enough of it. There’s a lot of other news out there – 2019 was before COVID, after all, so the environment was different – and people are dealing with a lot. But we could also talk about the lack of response following the passage of the voter suppression bill, whose introduction earlier this year generated a lot of pushback as well but nary a peep this time around. (Same for the various anti-trans bills, though at least they still have not passed.) It’s hard to maintain energy and focus against an enemy that never quits. It’s never too late to start responding – we will have elections next year, remember – and of course the federal government could respond as well – like the business community, they also act when they feel the heat. But we do need to put that heat on all of them, because the next thing you know we’ll be onto whatever the next thing is. Daily Kos has more.
THE WISDOM OF THE TALKING MULE
The businesses seem to be as astute as the Chronicle’s late Leon Hale (RIP) who once remarked: If I get into the political stuff, I am going to lose half of my readership. Better to update you all on the latest wisdom shared by the mule out at the fence. (paraphrased from recollection, but you can google the talking mule stuff, which is now legendary).
Commentarial note: We in the policywonqueria underground don’t sell anything, so we are not abiding by that common sense rule to cultivate the constituency.
RED MEAT AND FETUS-ON-A-STICK AVOIDANCE
As for the Dems and the reality-remote left conterpart to the extreme right, they have trouble acknowledging that many of their fellow Texans don’t like abortion – not to mention abortion absolutism — and that middle-ground moderates view the various ways and means to get rid of “it” at best as a necessary evil. Something to merely be tolerated, not celebrated, and better kept private.
Best way for Beto to lose: Campaign on a Fetus-Dismemberment Platform.
And don’t forget to educate the unwashed masses that the cardiac activity is all about the electrical stuff. Like, you know, the grid that the Govenor’s people on the PUC and ERCOT shut off in February.
Ain’t got nuffin’ to do with a having a heart.
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/anatomy-and-function-of-the-hearts-electrical-system
LINGO NOTE:
Cardio- is a combining form used like a prefix meaning “heart.” It is used in many medical and scientific terms. Cardio- comes from the Greek kardía, meaning “heart.” In fact, the English word heart and the Greek kardía are related.
SB8 DEFINITION:
(1) “Fetal heartbeat” means cardiac activity or the
steady and repetitive rhythmic contraction of the fetal heart
within the gestational sac.