Your Body is a Battleground // Part One: Oklahoma among states attempting to restrict birth control access

Editor's note: This article is the first in a new KPG series about recent attempts to restrict access to contraception, based largely on misinformation asserting that hormonal birth control methods are actually terminating pregnancies instead of preventing them. The series will also examine the tenuous legal ground upon which the right to birth control rests, what role contraception plays in the historical context of oppressing women, the potential health risks involved with pregnancy and childbirth, and what Project 2025 has to say about the issue.

August 9, 2024‍

The trend toward limiting access to some of the most widely used and effective forms of contraception has already begun in states like Missouri, Louisiana, and Idaho, according to a recent Washington Post report.

The Oklahoma Legislature is on the forefront of this trend, failing to pass two bills in 2024 that would have increased access to birth control and family planning healthcare. The debate over one of the measures raised eyebrows among reproductive health advocates across the state.

On May 29, one day before adjourning for the 2024 session, Senator Jo Anna Dossett (D-Tulsa) presented SB 1742 for final passage. The bill had already passed both the Oklahoma House and Senate, needing only certain amendments to be approved before heading to the governor's office. SB 1742 would have required employee health insurance plans which cover contraception to allow women to fill a twelve-month prescription at one time.

As allowed per Senate rules, freshman Senator Dusty Deevers (R-Elgin) rose to address the chamber. “When does a pregnancy begin?” he asked Dossett, the bill author.

Thus began a maelstrom of questions and statements from Deevers, who also serves as a pastor at Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Elgin. “Would you say it’s after implantation or at fertilization?” he asked.

Deevers went on to say that all hormonal birth control methods—IUDs, implants, injections, vaginal rings, patches, pills, and emergency contraception—are in effect abortifacients (meaning they cause abortions) because they prevent a fertilized egg from implanting into the uterine wall. “We must reject hormonal birth control from the moment of fertilization,” Deevers said.

Then Senator Warren Hamilton (R-McCurtain) debated against SB 1742. Rather than talk about health insurance plans, however, he delivered an indictment on what he called “the medical deception that we call birth control.”

“When we use these drugs, devices, et cetera, we are absolutely throwing the baby out with the bath water,” said Hamilton said. “Birth control has been offered in the spirit of help, [but] what it’s actually doing is causing more harm than good,” Hamilton said.

Next came Senator Casey Murdock (R-Felt), who offered measured support for SB 1742. “I do not like abortion. I am pro-life,” he said. “And I wanted to stand up and say, I am voting for this bill. I want to give adults the ability to be responsible.”

The bill ultimately passed the Senate, including language ensuring that “the provisions there in would never apply to any drug that could cause abortion,” Dossett said. In all, thirteen out of forty-eight Senators voted against the bill. Despite advancing from the Senate, the Oklahoma House did not approve the conference committee report, and SB 1742 died when session ended.‍

Lawmakers play tug-of-war over birth control access

Also in 2024, Representative Kevin West (R-Moore) worked with the Alliance Defending Freedom—a national Christian law firm that advances conservative culture-war issues, to file HB 3216, the “Oklahoma Life is a Human Right Act.” The bill, which did not advance but could return next year, would forbid anyone from enabling a pregnant woman to procure “any medicine, drug, or other substance with the specific intent of causing or abetting an abortion.” The bill defines “pregnant” as having a “unborn human being” within a woman’s body “from fertilization to full gestation and childbirth.” The bill also defines an “unborn human being” as a living person from “conception,” defined as the fertilization of a human egg by a human sperm. Using the flawed logic of abortion abolitionists, bills like HB 3216 could legally paint birth control into a corner wherein it could be construed to terminate pregnancy rather than prevent it. Neither Deevers nor West responded to KPG’s request for comment for this story.

Things weren't all bad at the state capitol. Another bill aimed to enshrine contraceptive access into law. Authored by Senator Jessica Garvin (R-Duncan) and Representative Toni Hasenbeck (R-Elgin), SB 368 was introduced during the 2023 legislative session. The bill would have protected women’s freedom to access birth control. “This measure sends a strong signal that the Oklahoma Legislature believes that Oklahomans can plan when to start a family and when to grow the size of their family,” Hasenbeck said. The bill passed both chambers before stalling in conference committee.

Contraception is not the only sexual health issue up for debate. At least two dozen bills were filed during the 59th Oklahoma Legislature (2023-2024) that would change or eliminate how (or if) public-school students receive sex education. The Oklahoma Health Education Act of 2021 added health to the state’s public-school subject matter standards, mandating that “all students shall receive the instruction needed to lead health and physically active lifestyles." To fulfill that mandate, some school districts have approved curricula that includes medically accurate, age-appropriate sex education, proven to reduce teen birth rates.

Part Two of our series will look at what other states are doing to protect (or restrict) access to birth control, and the legal reasons why this debate is happening right now.

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