Nation Conversations: Jordan Smith: Reproductive Health? Not in Rick Perry’s Texas

Nation Conversations: Jordan Smith: Reproductive Health? Not in Rick Perry’s Texas

Nation Conversations: Jordan Smith: Reproductive Health? Not in Rick Perry’s Texas

As governor of Texas, Rick Perry has deliberately and systematically bankrupted state-provided healthcare for low income and uninsured women.

Copy Link
Facebook
X (Twitter)
Bluesky
Pocket
Email

As governor of Texas, Rick Perry has deliberately and systematically bankrupted state-provided healthcare for low income and uninsured women.

Rick Perry has served as the  governor of Texas for nearly eleven years—and in that time, he has deliberately and systematically bankrupted state-provided healthcare for low income and uninsured women. In this week’s installment of Nation Conversations, associate editor Liliana Segura and Austin Chronicle staff writer Jordan Smith discuss Perry’s perverse alliance with anti-abortion activists, and explain how a political war against Planned Parenthood has compelled Perry’s administration to divert $31 million in federal money from preventative services, including HIV testing and cervical cancer exams. You can read Jordan’s recent expose on Perry’s “war on women” here.

Subscribe to Nation Conversations on iTunes for exclusive audio of Nation editors and writers digging into the topics and issues that shape the magazine. Check back each Thursday for a new episode each week.

—Teresa Cotsirilos

Support The Nation’s June Fundraising Campaign

With the midterm elections now firmly upon us, the question is whether Democratic candidates will do more than merely occupy ballot lines as mild alternatives to the red-hot crisis that is Donald Trump.

As Trump spends over $1 billion a day on a globally destabilizing war on Iran and admits that he doesn’t “think about Americans’ financial situation,” millions across the country are struggling with the surging costs of essentials. Democrats must seize this moment and advance bold, small-“d” populist ideas—not settle for cynical caution that once again snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.

The Nation elevates progressive ideas, movements, and elected officials achieving real change across the country into the national conversation. At the same time, our journalists are exposing how crypto and AI-funded super PACs are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to knock out candidates they oppose, reporting on the devastating impact of the Supreme Court’s evisceration of the Voting Rights Act, and sounding the alarm on attempts by red states to quickly redraw electoral maps, disenfranchising Southern Black voters.

We can play this critical role because of support from readers like you. This June, we’re raising $20,000 to power The Nation’s independent journalism in the run-up to November’s immensely consequential elections.

It’s in our power to build a more just society, and your support at this critical moment brings us closer to that bold vision. I hope you’ll donate today.

Onward,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editor and Publisher, The Nation

Ad Policy
x