How a small city in Kansas discovered itself on the heart of abortion’s nationwide second

PITTSBURG, Kan. — The Rev. Anthony Navaratnam stood earlier than his congregation and urged them to wish for the ladies from surrounding states who will flock to the brand new abortion clinic on the town that opened in August.

“God is giving us a chance to be missionaries in Pittsburg, Kansas,” he instructed these at Flag Church, which hosted a coaching on how one can protest outdoors of the clinic.

The controversy over reproductive rights has landed on this faculty city of 20,000 within the southeast nook of one of many few states left within the area nonetheless permitting abortions. It’s close to Missouri, Oklahoma and Arkansas and never terribly removed from Texas.

A spot this measurement, particularly one in a traditionally crimson state, was unlikely to have an abortion clinic earlier than Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022. Since then, Kansas has grow to be one in every of 5 states that individuals are most definitely to journey to to be able to get an abortion once they’re unable to at residence, mentioned Caitlin Myers, an economics professor at Middlebury Faculty who researches abortion insurance policies.

Abortions spiked in Kansas by 152% after Roe, in response to a latest analysis by the Guttmacher Institute, which helps abortion rights. Utilizing Myers’ rely, six of the clinics in Kansas, Illinois, New Mexico, North Carolina and Virginia which have opened or relocated post-Roe are in communities with fewer than 25,000 folks. Two others are in communities of fewer than 50,000.

“Kansas is de facto the one one on this area that may present care to many individuals in these surrounding states,” mentioned Kensey Wright, a member of the board of administrators for the Roe Fund in Oklahoma, which helps Kansas abortion clinics via grants.

“With out abortion clinics in that state, we’d be with out hope,” Wright mentioned.

Housed in a former urology workplace, Pittsburg’s Deliberate Parenthood clinic sits throughout the road from a medical clinic run by a Catholic well being care system. Behind the clinic are homes.

Clinic supervisor Logan Rink mentioned her mom used to work on this constructing as a nurse — a connection that’s “small-town stuff.” She loves this city, and mentioned her neighbors agree the clinic is required. However she was guarded in her optimism, saying ” the reception that we’re going to get from the group goes to be favorable in some methods and doubtless not all the time.”

Specialists mentioned smaller-sized clinics may be much less overwhelming for ladies who’re coming from rural areas, like these surrounding Pittsburg. However there is no such thing as a anonymity in these smaller communities, the place non secular and household ties typically run deep. Pittsburg was established in 1876, and settled largely by immigrants from Catholic-leaning international locations who got here to work at surrounding coal mines. There’s a typical most important road and a state college with about 7,400 college students.

“In a small city, it’s not simply that you just’ll know that individual. Your loved ones will know them. You’ll have recognized them for 40 years,” mentioned Dr. Emily Walters, a supporter of the Pittsburg clinic who works as an anesthesiologist at a hospital in neighboring Missouri. “Your tales will probably be intertwined.”

She puzzled aloud, “How do I see you at a protest after which see you the subsequent day on the grocery retailer and nonetheless have the ability to be well mannered and civil with one another?”

Walters additionally chairs the Crawford County Democratic Social gathering in an space that’s more and more Republican and has no Democratic state legislators — a change from 20 years in the past when there have been six. The county additionally has grow to be more and more non secular in the identical span; it now has twice as many white evangelical Protestants because the nationwide common, and barely extra Catholics, in response to the Public Faith Analysis Institute.

Simply 5 weeks after Roe was overturned in 2022, voters in Kansas needed to determine whether or not to strip the correct to an abortion from the state structure, which may have led to an outright ban. Regardless of the Republican and spiritual leanings, 55% of Crawford County voters have been a part of the 59% of voters statewide who killed the proposal.

It is in keeping with an Associated Press-NORC poll from 2024 that showed 6 in 10 Americans assume their state ought to typically permit an individual to acquire a authorized abortion in the event that they don’t wish to be pregnant for any cause. However the rural counties that surrounded Pittsburg selected in any other case on the poll field.

“I keep in mind folks have been stealing yard indicators, placing up totally different ones in folks’s yards,” mentioned Anastin Journot, an 18-year-old from Independence, Kansas, who’s majoring in elementary training at Pittsburg State. She mentioned she was alarmed by Roe getting overturned, remembering she thought: “What if I’m in a state of affairs the place I’m needing to get an abortion and it’s not an possibility?”

Abortion in Kansas is usually authorized up till the twenty second week of being pregnant. The clinic’s southern location places it nearer to states which have banned abortions as a substitute of sending folks to Kansas’ bigger cities, the place hours have been expanded and appointments are nonetheless in brief provide.

About 60% to 65% of people that name Deliberate Parenthood clinics in Kansas for an abortion appointment are turned away as a result of there is not sufficient capability, mentioned Emily Wales, president and CEO of Deliberate Parenthood Nice Plains. Already, Wales mentioned, the majority of individuals looking for abortions in Kansas are from out of state — largely Texas, which is about 5 hours south. After that, it is Missouri, a couple of minutes’ drive east and Oklahoma, lower than an hour away. She mentioned some come from as far-off as Louisiana and even Florida, which now prohibits the process after six weeks.

Clinics “strategically positioned close to (a state’s) border can actually assist ease the congestion,” mentioned Ushma Upadhyay, a public well being scientist on the College of California San Francisco who research abortion.

A lot of the space that’s 100 miles from the brand new clinic has been designated as medically underserved for main care by the federal authorities, and the variety of obstetricians and gynecologists for each 100,000 feminine residents is lower than half of the U.S. common.

For now, although, the main target on the Pittsburg clinic will probably be on abortion. Wales mentioned Deliberate Parenthood needs to slowly add extra companies over the subsequent two to a few months, and one future objective for the clinic is to supply gender-affirming care. Neighboring states have restricted that, too.

“Pittsburg goes to elevate up a complete lot of states within the South and assist folks get care,” Wales mentioned.

However these additions, she added, will come after employees will get used to the sufferers and the presence of protesters and opposition.

Donations are up at Vie Medical Clinic, the city’s crisis pregnancy center, govt director Megan Newman mentioned. Such facilities are sometimes religiously affiliated and encourage purchasers to proceed their pregnancies.

Folks against the Deliberate Parenthood clinic are also selecting up pamphlets about Vie to allow them to hand them out to these looking for abortions. “Once we obtained phrase that Deliberate Parenthood was coming, you possibly can simply form of really feel that within the city,” Newman mentioned.

Jeanne Napier, a 68-year-old who attends a neighborhood Baptist church, vowed as she shopped on the native mall that she’ll “be there day by day with indicators.”

Her daughter, Terri Napier, mentioned in a telephone interview she believes a part of her dad and mom’ opposition to the clinic is from watching her wrestle about 20 years in the past. She was in an abusive relationship with somebody who has since died. She obtained pregnant. The household was terrified of bringing a baby into the state of affairs.

She had an abortion, and spiraled into drug use. “I used to be at conflict with forgiving myself,” mentioned the 43-year-old, who’s now clear.

Jeanne Napier mentioned she felt like she inspired the abortion. “And I hate that,” she mentioned, “as a result of I want I may take that sin upon myself, so it’s actual private. I had an energetic play in terminating a life, and we don’t have that proper.”

Brianna Barnes, a 19-year-old journalism main at Pittsburg State who’s from Wichita, has protested and prayed outdoors of a clinic in her hometown.

“If somebody made eye contact with us, we simply smiled at them, form of exhibiting that love and care as a result of nobody responds properly to screaming, yelling, violence it doesn’t matter what aspect it’s on,” she mentioned simply after arriving on campus for the autumn semester. A lot of the college students the AP talked to voiced assist for the clinic.

Her mom, Crystal Barnes, 42, turned to her daughter: “You’re going to be the odd man out being a Catholic, and conservative, particularly with issues like abortion. It’s so heated.”

The Friday earlier than the clinic opened, crews put in a wood facade outdoors, the air crammed with the scent of fresh-cut lumber. Walters, the native anesthesiologist, had stopped by to test on the progress.

Walters’ assist comes from a private place. When she was 20 and the identical variety of weeks pregnant, she went to an emergency room, bleeding. She mentioned she was despatched residence to miscarry as a substitute of getting her labor induced or having a process to take away the fetus.

That have — “horrific, and wouldn’t be thought-about commonplace of care, in fashionable follow,” she mentioned — left her with a deep empathy for ladies in powerful positions.

Simply earlier than the 2022 vote, an advert backed by 400 Kansas docs who assist abortion rights ran in a number of the state’s largest papers, together with The Kansas Metropolis Star. Walters’ identify was listed first. Throughout that point, her residence deal with appeared on-line, a daunting prospect in a state the place abortion supplier Dr. George Tiller was shot useless in 2009 at his Wichita church by an anti-abortion extremist.

“It’s essential well being care for ladies,” she mentioned. “It’s going to be disruptive to Pittsburg. And that half hurts my coronary heart.”

___

Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas.

___

The Related Press Well being and Science Division receives assist from the Robert Wooden Johnson Basis. The AP is solely accountable for all content material.