To Win, They Have To Lie

Why Louisiana is reclassifying safe abortion pills as dangerous controlled substances.

Photo by Hal Gatewood on Unsplash

The Republican-dominated Louisiana state government is on the verge of reclassifying mifepristone and misoprostol, two abortion-inducing medications, as Schedule IV drugs — a categorization reserved for drugs they may cause addiction or abuse. Abortion pills are a lot of things — highly effective, often life-saving, and of course controversial — but they are not addictive, nor prone to being abused. No one is taking recreational abortion drugs. No one is addicted to abortion pills.

But Louisiana wants to further criminalize abortion and further terrorize women. Abortion is already broadly outlawed in Louisiana, but women who have abortions are not criminally punished; penalties are reserved for those who help women have abortions. This was not guaranteed: Just two years ago, a “pro-life” Louisiana lawmaker introduced legislation that would have tried women who have abortions for murder. The same legislator has also tried to criminalize IVF and contraception in the state. The bills failed because criminalizing women for abortion is broadly unpopular, even among many people who say abortion is murder (no, it doesn’t make sense), and the leaders of the anti-abortion are at least smart enough to know that pushing this particular issue too far may make them lose even more support.

So they look for workarounds. And one of those workarounds is targeting abortion pills for criminalization — and lying about what those pills do in order to make that happen.