Louisiana Doubles Down on ‘Coerced Abortion’ Narrative in Case Against Mother

The woman pleaded not guilty to a felony charge for allegedly buying abortion pills for her daughter—but state officials keep claiming she's guilty of "coercion."

By Kylie Cheung | March 12, 2025 | 6:00pm

Photo: Getty Images Abortion Politics

Louisiana Doubles Down on ‘Coerced Abortion’ Narrative in Case Against Mother

On Tuesday, a Louisiana mother pleaded not guilty to a felony for allegedly obtaining abortion pills, prescribed and shipped from a New York doctor, for her teen daughter. The doctor, Margaret Carpenter, was also indicted by the same West Baton Rouge jury, but New York’s shield laws—which protect health care workers from legal threats for providing abortion care to patients across state lines— have so far protected Carpenter from prosecution.

With the mother’s not guilty plea, prosecutors are doubling down on their unsubstantiated and conflicting claims that the woman “coerced” her daughter to take the abortion pills. West Baton Rouge District Attorney Tony Clayton and Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill (R) both reiterated to the Louisiana Illuminator’s Lorena O’Neil, who is also a Jezebel contributor, that the mother pressured and gave her daughter an ultimatum to take the medication. Clayton and Murrill laughably claim the criminal case is unrelated to reproductive health. Murrill has said several times that the mother’s supposed crime is “about coercion” and “forcing somebody to have an abortion who didn’t want one.” But neither Carpenter nor the mother faces coercion charges—just charges for violating the state’s abortion ban.

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Clayton told the Illuminator that police initially responded to an emergency call from the teen believing she was experiencing a miscarriage, but then “found out” she’d taken abortion pills. Eerily enough, prosecutors haven’t specified how police made this discovery.

State officials are also targeting Carpenter, who was indicted alongside the Louisiana woman in January. Separately, she faces a civil suit brought forth by Texas in December for allegedly sending abortion pills to a Dallas woman. Louisiana is currently trying to extradite Carpenter, though New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) has said “there’s no way in hell” that will happen. Nonetheless, Louisiana’s aggressive legal efforts suggest they hope to use their case against Carpenter to open the floodgates to target abortion providers everywhere. “Dr. Carpenter needs to be careful with her travel plans,” Murrill posted on social media in February. In a statement to the Louisiana Illuminator at the time, Murrill suggested Carpenter could face arrest if she sets foot in a GOP-led state: “The doctor could be arrested in other places. If New York won’t cooperate, there are other states that will.” (Interstate extradition, of course, is slightly more complicated than that.)

Murrill has called Carpenter a “drug dealer who victimized a child.” This framing about “coercion” is meant to dishonestly equate abortion access with abuse. Abortion, Every Day writer Jessica Valenti reported in 2023 that anti-abortion leaders have identified “coercion” as their most salient talking point to stigmatize and attack abortion.

The dark irony of it all is that not only do abortion bans further empower abusers to control and entrap their victims, but Texas was only able to bring forth its case against Carpenter at all because Paxton and anti-abortion activists are reportedly recruiting abusive, shitty men to snitch on their partners’ abortions. The goal is to use these tips to sue out-of-state doctors and try to challenge and throw out shield laws altogether. These same anti-abortion officials would have you think abortion providers like Carpenter are the abusers.

Louisiana enforces a total abortion ban threatening doctors in violation with up to 15 years in prison. In May, the state also became the first in the nation to enact a law prohibiting most people from possessing abortion pills unless they’re imminently allowed to take them, which is difficult and invasive to prove to law enforcement. The draconian law’s authors justified it by citing the case of a man who fed his partner abortion pills without her consent. That tragic incident has since been weaponized to effectively ban medication abortion across the state.

“We cannot continue to allow forced birth extremists to interfere with our ability to access necessary healthcare,” Chasity Wilson, executive director of the Louisiana Abortion Fund, said in February. “Extremists hope this case will cause a chilling effect, further tying the hands of doctors who took an oath to care for their patients.”