Washington, DC — California has become a safe haven for those seeking abortion care, and leading the way in the legal fight to protect and expand access is Democratic Attorney General Rob Bonta. Today, Politico’s Alice Ollstein wrote on the state’s new abortion laws that took effect earlier this year, and highlighted how AG Bonta and others are working to bring similar laws to more states to further expand access.

AG Bonta shared with Ollstein, “‘People look to California for leadership, and in these dark moments, we want to be a bright light,’ Democratic Attorney General Rob Bonta, who is already defending some of the new abortion-rights laws from legal challenges, said in an interview. ‘We made a menu of options that’s now publicly available for anyone. These laws are ready to be duplicated and replicated.’”

Politico also writes, “The first-in-the-nation mandate for student health centers to carry abortion pills is just one of more than a dozen new California policies that aim to make the state the nation’s leading haven for abortion rights. Now, Democrats are holding up California as a model as New York, Washington, Illinois and other blue states prepare to enact similar policies in 2023.”

“Now, Maine Democrats are pushing a bill to eliminate copays for abortion, a policy California enacted last year and that Bonta is defending in court from a lawsuit filed by anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers.”

“Maryland lawmakers recently invited Bonta to testify as they debated their own measures to shield abortion providers and their patients from prosecution, and California officials met with Vice President Kamala Harris, formerly the state’s attorney general, to walk her through the new policies and offer advice for other states that want to follow suit.”

“The Newsom administration created a website that lists all of the actions the state has taken related to abortion — administrative, executive and legislative — with the full bill language available should any legislator in another state want to copy it.”

“California’s new abortion laws were crafted to serve two purposes: To shore up protections for people seeking and providing abortions and to expand access to the procedure.”

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