Two years after Texas’ Republican leadership slashed funding for family planning in an effort to put Planned Parenthood out of business, Texas was still a hotbed of debate on women’s health and abortion. Although a partisan debate on abortion divided the legislature in a special session, state lawmakers had banded together in the regular legislative session to restore family planning financing to help low-income women prevent unintended pregnancies. When the 83rd legislative session began, family planning providers were still reeling from budget cuts Republican lawmakers approved in 2011. To mitigate the lingering damage of those cuts, lawmakers worked across the aisle to approve the largest financial package in state history for women’s health serviceing $100 million to expand primary care services and $71 million to finance the Texas Women’s Health Program. Despite an unspoken agreement between many lawmakers to avoid anti-abortion in the regular session, Gov. Rick Perry called lawmakers back to approve a 20-week ban on abortion and other regulations in a special session. Democratic State Sen. Wendy Davis’s successful filibuster of the measures drew national attention, and ultimately, hardened Republican leadership’s resolve to pass some of the strictest abortion regulations in the country. Throughout the budget negotiations, the 13-hour filibuster and the roll out of the new abortion restrictions, The Texas Tribune has provided the most consistent coverage in the state on the intersection of politics and women’s health care. Meanwhile, we’ve conducted multiple investigations to evaluate the broader impact of the state’s decisions. The Tribune’s investigation of state safety records found little evidence to support Republican lawmakers’ claims that existing abortion facilities were unsafe. And by analyzing claims data for the Texas Women’s Health Program, we also found evidence that the program had distributed 38 percent less contraception, and provided 23 percent fewer women’s wellness exams in the first six months of 2013 than those months in 2012. We also produced an ongoing series, “The Politics of Prevention,” which documents the looming legal battle over Texas’ new abortion restrictions and the ongoing effects of the state’s family planning policies on contraception and cancer-screening programs for low-income women.
