Jennifer Rubin has a good rant some of the latest anti-abortion laws in Texas, where complaints are expected to be registered by citizens and not by law enforcement personnel:
Consider the potential for harassment, spying, extortion and other vengeful behavior directed toward women. The law depends on what a woman’s neighbors, associates and friends know about her reproductive health and are willing to tell the authorities to grab a $10,000 bounty. The possibility of frivolous litigation is hard to quantify.
Texas Republicans lack the nerve to uniformly enforce the law or to defend its constitutionality. Professor Steve Vladeck of the University of Texas tells me, “It’s a deeply cynical effort to both (1) chill conduct that ought to be constitutionally protected; and (2) provide cover for judges to find creative ways to dodge the merits of the constitutional challenge.” This is a law designed not to “protect life” (a farce, given that protecting innocent life has taken a back seat when covid-19 restrictions were at issue), but rather to create fear and uncertainty for women and health-care providers. Will miscarriages lead to a lawsuit from a nosy office worker seeking to cash in on the reward? Will abortion bounties become a weapon in divorce and custody cases? No one knows — and that is the point. The law seeks not to protect the fetus in any systematic way but rather to intimidate women, making them into cash cows for spiteful anti-choice busybodies. [WaPo]
Even more importantly, will employers take due note of this embarrassment and leave the state? How about high-skill personnel who realize that societal chaos isn’t a desirable characteristic of work or home environment?
People value predictability. What happens when that first fallacious suit is brought to court by the busybody who’s a little short on paying off their gambling debts? And everyone pays attention?
Add in a bit of climate change, and we may see the start of a mass migration, of companies and people, leaving the formerly great State of Texas.
And events no longer being held in Texas, as socially conscious companies decline to use Texas venues, or social justice groups pressure corporations to not use Texas.
There may be a lot more backlash to this anti-abortion law than Texas state legislators are anticipating.
