Indiana Attempts to Restrict Access to Medication Abortion, Spreads Misinformation to Intimidate Patients and Providers
INDIANAPOLIS, IN — This week, 13 states, including Indiana, sent a letter calling on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to restrict access to medication abortion across the country. Their request falsely claims mifepristone is a threat to the water supply. In reality, mifepristone is a safe and effective way to end pregnancy, and there is no evidence that it threatens environmental safety. These efforts rely on misinformation rather than evidence, fostering an environment that intimidates patients seeking care and clinicians committed to providing safe, legal, and evidence-based health care.
The Indiana Reproductive Health & Access Coalition (RHAC) called out Attorney General Todd Rokita for recklessly misusing the EPA’s regulatory process to spread unfounded fears about mifepristone.
Haley Bougher, Indiana State Director, Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates:
“This politically-motivated effort to restrict abortion access under the guise of water quality is flat-out fearmongering and reinforces the same brand of junk science anti-abortion politicians have been using for years. Attorney General Rokita and his anti-abortion cohort are politicizing unfounded environmental concerns to restrict access to medication that is safe, FDA-approved and has been used for more than two decades by millions of Americans. Dressing up anti-abortion sentiment as public health doesn't make it real science; it just makes the fear more marketable.
“It’s political acts like this that have caused a very real public health crisis that forces constituents to leave their home states to access necessary reproductive health care. If these Attorneys General truly cared about Americans, they would stop restricting access to reproductive health care, period. The people of Indiana — and all the other impacted states — deserve honest, evidence-based governance. This isn’t it.”
Danielle Drake, Advocacy Manager, ACLU of Indiana:
“The Attorney General is once again using the power of his office to spread fear and go after evidence-based health care. No one in Indiana should have to worry that politicians are looking over their shoulder when they make personal decisions about their health. Mifepristone is safe, effective, and FDA-approved. Trying to restrict it through baseless environmental claims is not about public health. It is about intimidation, control, and inserting the government into decisions that belong to people and their doctors.”
Mifepristone has helped ensure patients are able to make their own private medical decisions and has expanded access to evidence-based abortion and miscarriage care, access that remains under dire threat in this country.
This letter is just the latest attempt by anti-abortion extremists to pursue their ultimate goal of banning abortion in every form. This ploy to reverse-engineer a restriction on medication abortion by weaponizing environmental law is not only wrong — it’s dangerous.
###
About the Indiana Reproductive Health and Access Coalition (IRHAC): IRHAC is a statewide coalition of community organizers, advocates, health care providers, legal experts, and storytellers united to defend reproductive freedom and promote equitable access to health care for all Hoosiers.
PLANNED PARENTHOOD ALLIANCE ADVOCATES – INDIANA
Indiana Reproductive Freedom PAC
MADVoters
American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana
The Indiana Section of the American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists
Good Trouble Coalition
Indiana Task FORCE
Hoosier Jews for Choice
Women4Change Indiana
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 12, 2026
CONTACT: Nicole Erwin, Strategic Communications Manager, Nicole.Erwin@ppallianceadvocates.org
Indiana Court Grants Permanent Injunction in ACLU of Indiana Religious Freedom Challenge to Abortion Ban
This press release was originally posted on March 5, 2026 on the ACLU of Indiana website.
INDIANAPOLIS – Today, the Marion County Superior Court granted a permanent injunction preventing Indiana from enforcing Senate Enrolled Act 1 (SEA 1), the state’s near-total abortion ban, against the plaintiffs and certified class when doing so would conflict with their sincerely held religious beliefs.
The Court agreed that Indiana’s abortion law imposes a substantial burden on religious exercise protected by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). More than three years after the case was filed, the court's order makes permanent the protection that had remained in place while the litigation moved through the courts.
Because the court certified the case as a class action, today’s ruling reaches beyond the named plaintiffs and protects all Hoosiers whose religious beliefs direct them to obtain abortions that would otherwise be prohibited by the ban.
“Today’s ruling is a recognition that religious freedom protects people of many faiths and beliefs, not just those favored by the state,” said Stevie Pactor, Senior Staff Attorney at the ACLU of Indiana. “For more than three years, our clients have challenged a law that forces them to choose between their faith and their autonomy. This decision makes it clear that Indiana cannot enforce its abortion ban in ways that violate their religious freedom.”
A copy of the court’s order is available here.
Media Contact
McKenzie Conrad, Senior Communications Specialist, media@aclu-in.org
Indiana Reproductive Health and Access Coalition Opposes SB 236
IRHAC opposes sb 236
Indianapolis, IN —The Indiana Reproductive Health and Access Coalition (IRHAC) strongly opposes SB 236, a dangerous escalation of Indiana’s already extreme abortion ban. SB 236 passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee last week despite hours of testimony reflecting widespread concern about the bill’s implementation and its impact on privacy, health care clinicians, and access to essential reproductive health care. Ignoring continued concerns, the full Senate voted to advance the bill again, 35-10, sending it to the House.
Even with cosmetic amendments, SB 236 remains a sweeping pregnancy policing scheme that further erodes access to reproductive health care in Indiana. Hoosiers should not be misled by these surface-level revisions. This bill is still profoundly harmful, and here’s why:
Creates a Texas-style “bounty hunter” legal environment that places a hefty price on Hoosiers’s private health care decisions. It allows private individuals to sue providers, pharmacists, manufacturers, or even friends and family members they believe are involved in medication abortion care, with the promise of financial rewards reaching hundreds of thousands of dollars. This structure invites surveillance, harassment, and unwanted legal exposure by strangers, unsupportive family members, and abusive partners.
Allows the Indiana Attorney General to sue on behalf of the fetus, expanding the legal definition of personhood. It empowers the Indiana Inspector General, a non-health care appointee of Governor Braun, to review individual abortion complication reports, granting access to deeply personal medical information with the goal to identify violations of the Indiana abortion ban for prosecution.This will have a chilling effect for those who provide care to pregnant people and will increase the risks of patient harm and death. Court cases brought under SB 236 would rely on sensitive medical records, pregnancy timelines, digital history, and private communications—dragging pregnant people and their physicians into court without their consent.
“This is pregnancy policing at its most extreme,” said Haley Bougher, Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates “SB 236 replaces trust in medical care with fear, surveillance, and punishment. It will deter people from seeking care and force health care clinicians to practice under constant threat.”
By advancing illegitimate fetal personhood concepts, inserting contradicting abortion definitions, and intensifying civil liability tied to handling, shipping, and distributing medication abortion, SB 236 also creates a dangerous slippery slope that could threaten basic pregnancy care like contraception, IVF, miscarriage care, and medical privacy in the future.
“This is a thinly veiled attempt to scare people away from accessing health care by deputizing and financially incentivizing private citizens to police their own communities. We see right through it. Hoosiers deserve better, and this bill will cause real harm to pregnant people and the people who care for them,” Danielle Drake, ACLU of Indiana. “We urge Indiana lawmakers to reject this bill and protect the dignity, safety, and health of Hoosiers.”
“Statewide polling has shown time and time again that an overwhelming number of Hoosiers do not want government meddling in their private health care decisions. This bill takes existing laws restricting reproductive freedom in this state and puts them on steroids,” Liane Hulka, Indiana Reproductive Freedom PAC.
The Indiana Reproductive Health and Access Coalition will continue organizing, educating, and advocating against policies that criminalize pregnancy, undermine medical privacy, and restrict access to comprehensive reproductive health care.
About the Indiana Reproductive Health and Access Coalition (IRHAC): IRHAC is a statewide coalition of community organizers, advocates, health care providers, legal experts, and storytellers united to defend reproductive freedom and promote equitable access to health care for all Hoosiers.
Learn more at indianarepro.org
Liane Hulka, Executive Director, Indiana Reproductive Freedom PAC
Haylee Sanford, Director of Engagement, Coburn Place
Linda Hanson, President, League of Women Voters of Indiana
Haley Bougher, Indiana State Director, Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates
Cara Berg Raunick, co-chair, Hoosier Jews for Choice
Angela Carr Klitzsch, CEO, Women4Change Indiana Action Fund
Danielle Drake, ACLU of Indiana
Media Contact
Nicole Erwin, Strategic Communications Manager, nicole.erwin@ppallianceadvocates.org