Washington Is Planning to Burn 30,000 Abortion Pills

While the state’s previous governor purchased a stockpile in 2023, those pills are set to expire in January, and officials say they’re left with “no options.”

By Danielle Han | September 11, 2025 | 12:08pm

Photo: Getty Images Politics

Washington Is Planning to Burn 30,000 Abortion Pills

In 2023, following the death of Roe and in anticipation of a second Trump administration, Washington’s then-Governor Jay Inslee (D) braced for the worst and squirreled away a first-in-the-country stockpile of nearly 30,000 doses of mifepristone, the first part of a two-pill medication abortion regime (the second being misoprostol). Now, according to the Washington State Standard, the Evergreen State is planning to incinerate that stockpile.

Inslee paid nearly $1.3 million for the pills in 2023, but they’re supposed to expire at the end of January. But, in a country where at least 29 states have near-total abortion bans (and 12 states have a total ban) and the GOP is hot and heavy on banning the pill for good, it seems prudent that Washington would find… somewhere for them to go. Unfortunately, Brian Aho, the spokesperson for current Gov. Bob Ferguson, said they can’t sell the pills for less than they paid, which is far higher than any wholesale price. Complicating it further is that they can only sell to qualified clinics and prescribers, thanks to a reverse injunction filed by a federal judge in July.

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Reportedly, the projected cost for destroying the pills will be less than $1,000. And despite how that price is but a fraction compared to the Trump administration’s near-$170,000 expenditure to torch $10 million worth of contraceptives in July, it paints a grim picture alongside the Americans who face a shortage of access to the pills today.

“We continue to be open to options to utilize the stockpile before it expires, but at this point, there is not a demand for it,” Aho told the Standard. (Funny, considering medication abortion was used for 63% of all abortions in 2023, and across the country, one in four abortions is provided through telehealth with medication.)

Considering Washington is one of nine states where abortion is still legal, the move is a disappointing one. But remember, this is the same state whose Democrats, earlier this year, caught heat after proposing an $8.5 million cut to abortion services—despite campaigning on the promise to expand abortion access.

“Given what’s happening around the country, access to abortion care remains fragile for many,” Executive Director Sami Alloy of Pro-Choice Washington, a reproductive-rights advocacy group, told Jezebel in a statement. Still, her organization is “grateful that the state took quick action to acquire these pills at a time when access was under threat.”

Planned Parenthood Washington Director Courtney Normand also told the Standard that—aside from Washington burning its stockpile—they’re mostly worried about the GOP effort to ban the abortion pill. Normand specifically cited the current lawsuit against the FDA filed by the attorneys general in Idaho, Kansas, and Missouri in 2024. The complicated proceedings, which have a twisty and infuriating history, ask the agency to restrict access to mifepristone. Last week, Texas and Florida asked to join.

“If things go south in Texas,” Normand continued, “then mifepristone access nationwide will be blocked.”

Before leaving office in January, Inslee purchased another 17,600 doses for $757,000, which aren’t set to expire until 2028 and early 2029. But if the GOP has its way, those doses could soon be deemed worthless as well.

“The expiration date on the medication just points to a need for Washington to find a solution to get the remaining pills into the hands of patients and providers,” Alloy tells Jezebel. “Like our friend Jessica Valenti recently joked, why not just airdrop them over Texas?”

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