Women in the US—no matter what state they live in—deserve access to abortion pills by mail, and providers like Dr. Maggie Carpenter won’t be intimidated into stopping.
That’s the message Julie F. Kay, an internationally recognized women’s human rights attorney, wants to share in the wake of criminal charges being filed against Dr. Carpenter, her colleague and cofounder of the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine.
In what appears to be the first such case, Margaret D. Carpenter, MD, a family medicine doctor from New Paltz, New York, was indicted on criminal charges late last week by a grand jury in Louisiana. Carpenter, the indictment claims, prescribed abortion pills to the mother of a pregnant minor via an online appointment. Carpenter, Carpenter’s practice Nightingale Medical PC, and the girl’s mother (who turned herself in to police on Friday) were all charged with “criminal abortion by means of abortion-inducing drugs, a felony.” Abortion is illegal in Louisiana with few exceptions, that don’t even include rape or incest.
Dr. Carpenter, who with Kay and another physician, Linda Prine, MD, founded the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine (or ACT), was also sued in civil court last year by the state of Texas for providing pills by mail.
New York governor Kathy Hochul said on X.com this week that she “will not comply with an extradition request” for Dr. Carpenter. New York State has a shield law that protects any physician in the state from prosecution if they prescribe abortion pills to patients in a state where the procedure is restricted. And on Monday, Hochul signed another bill that allowed doctors to list their practice’s name on out-of-state prescriptions rather than their own name, in order to offer them protection from violence or harassment.
Kay and her cofounders have never been under the illusion that their organization, which they founded in 2022 following the fall of Roe v. Wade, would not be targeted for their work. And she tells Glamour that Friday’s indictment won’t dissuade them from their mission.
“They have turned back the clock on our abortion rights, but [they’re] not going to be able to stop the fact that so many Americans do want access to abortion and that so many women and pregnant people need it,” she says.
Kay spoke with Glamour about the critical services ACT provides—as a network of information and support for doctors seeking to help women in restricted states access reproductive care—their preparations for the Trump administration, and what we all can do to support the work.
Glamour: As an organization, were you preparing for this to happen?
Julie F. Kay: We’re not surprised. We saw, during this last election even, increasing evidence that Americans overwhelmingly support abortion rights. When given the chance to vote on that issue, they will always vote to expand access to abortion where possible. But we also know this is an administration that continues to treat women’s health and women’s rights as a political football.