US Rep. Deborah Ross sponsors bill to protect reproductive health privacy

Threats to the privacy (and even the freedom and safety) of women seeking abortions and other forms of reproductive healthcare has been much in the news since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade.

With several states moving to quickly criminalize abortion and some even pursuing efforts to ban travel to states where the care remains lawful, concerns have arisen that law enforcement officers seeking to enforce abortion bans might use digital technology to track women and those who would aid them in interstate travel.

A new proposal in the U.S. House sponsored by Wake County Democrat Deborah Ross seeks to address the issue head-on.

According to a release from the lawmaker’s office, she and four other Democratic co-sponsors — Reps. Ted W. Lieu (CA-36), Sara Jacobs (CA-51), Hillary Scholten (MI-03), and Maxwell Frost (FL-10) — have proposed a bill entitled the Reproductive Data Privacy and Protection Act. The release explains the proposal this way:

While evidence of the use of such tactics by law enforcement appears limited thus far, the grounds for concern appear genuine.

In February U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) uncovered and disclosed evidence that an anti-abortion advocacy group had obtained cellphone data from a data broker of people who had visited Planned Parenthood facilities across the U.S. and then targeted those individuals with repeated anti-abortion phone messages.

Meanwhile, Newsweek reported earlier this week that “Some California police departments are continuing to share automated license plate reader data with other states which could use the information to track people seeking or providing abortions, according to civil liberties groups.”

Pro-choice advocates have also expressed concern that digital tracking could be extended to monitor and prosecute individuals over their use of in vitro fertilization and even birth control at some point in the future. Last August, CNN reported that Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall stated in court documents that his office was entitled to “prosecute people who make travel arrangements for pregnant women to have out-of-state abortions.”

In her statement, Rep. Ross observed that North Carolina’s recently enacted 12-week abortion ban has created a situation in which “some women are terrified to seek the reproductive health care services they need, and doctors are facing insurmountable obstacles to providing care. We must protect women and doctors from insidious actors who want to restrict and control abortion access even further through data collection and surveillance.”

Click here to read the legislation.