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Marijuana Industry Workers Are The Happiest In Any Job Sector In The U.S., Survey Finds
By Kyle Jaeger
June 25th, 2025
Hourly workers in the marijuana industry rank at the top of the list of “happiest” employees across multiple sectors—with more than 9 in 10 reporting a “positive sentiment” in their job—according to a new survey.
The annual Shift Pulse Report from the workforce management platform Deputy gauged how hourly workers felt about their jobs in 10 common industries—from cannabis to cleaning services to firearms.
While the overall finding of the report is that American workers are becoming less happy, with the happiness sentiment down to 78.5 percent in 2025 compared to 80 percent the prior year, the sector with the most content employees work at marijuana or e-cigarette/tobacco businesses.
A total of nearly 92 percent of cannabis and tobacco hourly workers said they feel positively about their jobs. By contrast, that sentiment is shared by 91 percent of hourly employees at catering, 90 percent in cafes, 90 percent of those in dentistry, 89 percent in gyms, 87 percent in firearms, 86 percent in sit-down restaurants, 84 percent in cleaning services and 83 percent in childcare.
“This may reflect stronger workplace culture and wage competitiveness in newer, regulated industries that prioritize employee retention as they scale rapidly,” Deputy said.
It’s also notable that cannabis sector hourly workers report higher levels of happiness in their trade considering that the industry faces unique challenges under federal prohibition, which has included an outsized risk of being targeted in robberies since many marijuana businesses operate in a largely cash-based environment.
“This year’s happiest industry sectors reveal a growing trend: purpose, predictability, and a sense of control over one’s workday matter just as much—if not more—than prestige or pay alone,” the report says. “For employers looking to improve sentiment, these industries offer practical lessons in team cohesion, autonomy, and culture-building.”
The “unhappiest sectors” among American hourly workers are those in pharmaceuticals (14 percent), delivery and postal services (14 percent), animal health (12 percent), doctor’s offices (12 percent), outpatient care centers (10 percent) and other hospitality services (8 percent).
“The 2025 Shift Pulse Report reveals sharp divides across the U.S. in how shift workers feel about their jobs—with sentiment driven not just by geography, but also by local economic conditions, industry makeup, and cultural attitudes toward work,” Deputy said.
“For employers and policymakers, this is a call to action: where people live still heavily influences how they feel about the work they do—and no single national strategy will solve for sentiment without considering these local realities,” the report concludes.
The report is based on an analysis of 1,515,790 Shift Pulse survey responses submitted by shift workers across the U.S. between April 2024 and April 2025.
Marijuana workers might rank among the happiest among various sectors, but they’re not without their set of challenges. Beyond the limited banking issue, there has also been a push to ensure that these employees are able to enter into labor peace agreements—a policy that’s been built into legalization laws in several states.
A federal judge recently struck down a voter-approved Oregon law that required licensed marijuana businesses enter into such agreements with workers and mandated that employers remain neutral in discussions around unionization.
Texas delivers potential major milestone for hemp and medical marijuana
By Chris Roberts, Reporter
June 25, 2025
https://mjbizdaily.com/texas-delivers-potential-major-milestone-for-hemp-and-medical-marijuana/
The way Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick sees it, the greatest gift the American THC industry is likely to enjoy in 2025 came late Sunday.
“The governor of the state of Texas wants to legalize recreational marijuana in the state of Texas,” Patrick said Monday, lamenting Gov. Greg Abbott’s surprising veto of a strict ban on hemp-derived THC.
“That’s the headline, folks.”
Abbott’s rejection of Senate Bill 3 – which would have banned hemp-derived THC outright in the state – is a stunning political reversal in the eyes of Patrick, long considered one of the most powerful figures in Texas politics and a proponent of the ban since last December.
It’s also an enormous reprieve for the state’s estimated $5.5 billon hemp industry, which Texas lawmakers will be on notice to regulate during a special session scheduled for late July.
The day before his veto, Abbott signed into law a significant expansion of Texas’ heretofore extremely limited medical marijuana program.
Starting Sept. 1, more powerful medical marijuana will be available to a greater number patients than ever before – and it can be produced and sold by up to 15 licensed companies, up from the current restrictive cap of three.
Texas poised to lead U.S. in THC – and THC policy
The remarkable weekend for THC in Texas is laying the foundation for significant advances for both the hemp and the regulated marijuana industries – in business as well as politics.
It also might be the beginning of the end of a bifurcated market for hemp-derived THC and marijuana – and the start of what most observers agree eventually will be known as a “THC industry.”
Texas is already one of the largest markets in the country for transformative products such as the hemp-derived beverages that both marijuana multistate operators and traditional alcohol companies and retailers are rushing to sell in other states.
Workable regulations will create confidence for big operators desperate for some stability amid an inconsistent nationwide patchwork of conflicting laws.
But Texas is also queuing up yet another struggle between marijuana and hemp, which in many markets have eyed each other as unwelcome intruders rather than just competitors.
However, Texas also might hold the key to some of the major questions vexing policymakers on Capitol Hill as well as state legislatures.
Most observers agree that, in the long term, marijuana and hemp – botanically identical plants that are differentiated only by their THC content – cannot continue to be regulated separately.
In this way, the unlikely source for the answer to how unified THC regulations might be reasonably and effectively crafted might well be Texas.
‘Room for both’ hemp and medical marijuana
“The way we’ve regulated this plant (to date), it’s not how everyday cannabis consumers perceived what legalization would look like,” said Kevin Caldwell, the southeast legislative manager at the Washington, D.C.-based Marijuana Policy Project, a major nationwide policy reform advocacy group.
“I think there’s room for both” medical marijuana and hemp, he added.
“And I also think a robust hemp market is what will keep the medical cannabis industry grounded.”
“Texas has a real opportunity here,” added Shawn Hauser, a partner at Denver-based law firm Vicente.
If Texas does end up funding medical research – as promised in the legislation – and if companies develop more sophisticated medical formulations, “it could be a better medical program than some states have.”
Meanwhile, Hauser added, the existence of an enormous, regulated market in a red state will have consequences for the few U.S. markets without access to regulated cannabis as well as on federal policymaking.
“If a state with as big a market as Texas allows those products to be available online, good luck maintaining prohibition.”
Unclear how hemp, medical marijuana will coexist
It remains to be seen how a preserved hemp market will get along with an expanded medical marijuana industry in Texas – or whether yet another conflict between sellers of THC is brewing.
Observers give partial credit for the explosive rise of hemp-derived THC in Texas to the decade-old, notoriously restrictive Texas Compassionate Use Program (TCUP).
According to a state Department of Public Safety analysis, there are fewer than 30,000 “active patients” among a population of 32 million.
As critics have long pointed out, the relatively few patients who qualified to buy low-THC oil under the TCUP must often drive long distances to obtain medical marijuana from one of only three companies granted state business licenses.
Both those barriers as well as the proliferation of cheaper, more plentiful and more accessible hemp-derived THC alternatives have hurt Texas’ MMJ companies – some of whom have hired “powerful Republican lobbyists” to back the hemp ban, the Houston Chronicle reported.
The three MMJ companies operating in Texas were reluctant to comment to MJBizDaily about Abbott’s veto of SB3 and how they might coexist with regulated hemp products:
· Nico Richardson, CEO of Manchaca-based Texas Original, declined comment.
· In a statement, Nicholas Fallon, Texas market president at Austin-headquartered Goodblend, an affiliate of Florida marijuana operator Surterra Wellness, praised state lawmakers for signing House Bill 46, which also eases MMJ companies’ distribution problems by allowing them to store products overnight at satellite locations. However, Fallon did not respond to MJBizDaily‘s specific questions about hemp and SB3.
· Fluent Cannabis, based in Schulenburg, did not immediately respond.
‘Massive win but not end of the battle’
Another potential wrinkle is whether MMJ companies in Texas will start offering hemp products to complement their offerings.
“Here’s the thing: You never hear hemp people say, ‘We need to get rid of the marijuana industry,’ said Cynthia Cabrera, the chief strategy officer for Austin-based hemp company Hometown Hero and the president of the Texas Hemp Business Council.
“But you will constantly hear marijuana people say, ‘We need to get rid of hemp.’”
In addition to input from MMJ operators, Texas lawmakers will hear competing voices from liquor and beer lobbyists during the special session.
Some of them want to claim a piece of the hemp market through mandatory third-party distributors; others fear further decline in sales from younger consumers more interested in hemp beverages than alcohol.
It’s still far from clear what final form hemp will take in Texas, though Abbott’s veto message included one page of bullet-pointed recommendations.
Those include restrictions seen in other states, such as:
· Limiting access to adults 21 and older.
· Mandating child-resistant packaging and banning logos or marketing deemed attractive to children.
· Banning sales on Sundays, similar to liquor.
Most of those recommendations were found in a hemp regulatory bill that failed to pass the Texas Legislature earlier this year.
And, for the most part, the hemp industry is generally agreeable to them.
Notably, controversial so-called THCA flower – which most observers agree is marijuana claiming federal protection under an accommodating interpretation of the 2018 Farm Bill – is already illegal in Texas, Cabrera said.
However, many merchants continue to offer THCA flower because law enforcement hasn’t taken any notable action, she added.
In all, the weekend’s developments were “a massive win,” Cabrera said.
“But it’s not the end of the battle.”
Marijuana Opponents ‘Have Lost’ The Debate, GOP Senator Says, Arguing ‘It’s Time’ To Regulate It Like Alcohol And Tobacco
By Kyle Jaeger
June 25th, 2025
A GOP senator says opponents of marijuana legalization “have lost” the fight to maintain prohibition and that “it’s time” for lawmakers to address that reality by creating a regulatory framework treating cannabis “in the same way that we do with alcohol and tobacco,” so that states can set their own policies without federal intervention.
During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday that featured witnesses from the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) pressed the DEA representative on cannabis policy issues.
“I have tried to keep pounding the table and saying, ‘Folks, those of us who were not necessarily eager to legalize pot have lost,'” the senator said. “The majority of states have legalized it at some level or another. I don’t really have a whole lot of emotions about it personally, but for the fact that I don’t think we’re regulating it properly, and I do believe it’s just become another distribution channel for the cartels.”
Tillis seemed to be arguing that the absence of federal regulations, and the policy disconnect with states that have increasingly enacted legalization, has created a vacuum that’s allowed illicit operators to thrive.
“We’ve got to get this under control. We have to realize that pot is going to be legal in this country in one form or another, and virtually every other state,” he said. “We can either figure out how to regulate it by putting a U.S. Department of Agriculture regimen in [and] an [Food and Drug Administration, or FDA] regimen in the same way that we do with alcohol and tobacco are.”
“We’re going to get way down the road without control over inputs, and the next thing the cartels are going to do is figure out how they can put—in the race for potency, once they run out of how you can actually do this through the plants, they’re going to figure out some way to make this more potent and more deadly,” the senator said.
He also said that he feels “very strongly that we need to have a separate meeting about how do we create a construct that, if states want to opt into, they can—not make it legal federally—or this is getting out of control.”
The senator also spent time pressing DEA Special Agent in Charge Los Angeles Field Division Matthew Allen on an issue in his home state, where the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians has legalized both medical and adult-use cannabis while the rest of the state remains under a system of broad prohibition.
Despite repeatedly calling for a federal regulatory structure for marijuana, Tillis has consistently taken issue with the policy disconnect between state, federal and tribal governments. However, he said he recognizes “they have a right to sell marijuana, I guess, as a as a recognized tribe.”
“But they’re growing in one place and selling in another place. Not only are they—and let’s face it, folks, it’s a casino operation. It’s a destination. People are buying this stuff,” he said, referring to the Cherokees’ land, called the Qualla Boundary. “You’d have to be out of your mind to think that they’re going to dispose of whatever is not used by the time they leave.”
It’s an “anomaly” that represents “one example of what happens when Congress fails to act on something that I think it’s time for us to act on,” Tillis said.
Back in February, the senator also raised the issue during a Senate Banking Committee hearing, saying “we should reexamine [federal marijuana laws].” But at the same time, “we damn sure shouldn’t do it by passing” legislation that would simply prevent federal regulators from penalizing banks that work with state-legal cannabis businesses.
“If somebody wants to work on rules of the road and do that—and bank the industry in a cohesive, sustainable way that doesn’t kind of skirt around the fact that it’s still illegal at the federal level—count me in. Happy to do it,” Tillis said.
Tillis also said last December that he’s hopeful Congress will have a “discussion” about potentially creating a federal regulatory framework for marijuana in 2025, though he added that he personally wouldn’t vote to federally legalize cannabis.
Last July, the senator separately said that he supports creating a “comprehensive regulatory framework that treats marijuana just like tobacco,” arguing that “the federal government needs to figure out a safe way to allow this market to occur.”
The latest remarks in the Senate committee hearing come about two months after Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH) once again introduced the Preparing Regulators Effectively for a Post-Prohibition Adult-Use Regulated Environment Act (PREPARE) Act, which would direct the attorney general to create a commission charged with making recommendations on a regulatory system for cannabis that models what’s currently in place for alcohol.
MORE MONTANA NEWS
Montana Family Foundation sues over constitutional amendment to protect abortion
by KEILA SZPALLER Daily Montanan | June 25, 2025 12:00 AM
The state of Montana deprived voters, especially those who registered on Election Day, of the ability to fully evaluate the language of Constitutional Initiative 128 — to protect abortion in the state Constitution — according to a recent lawsuit.
Filed earlier this month by the Montana Family Foundation, the lawsuit alleges the full text of the amendment should have been printed on the ballot instead of just a summary of the proposed Constitutional amendment.
It alleges that voters who registered on Election Day were particularly harmed because they don’t receive the voter guide distributed in advance by the Montana Secretary of State’s Office — which includes the “complete text” of any Constitutional amendment.
In November 2024, Montana voters supported CI-128 to enshrine abortion into the Montana Constitution with 58% approval. The amendment also prevents the government from penalizing patients or providers.
But plaintiffs Hannah Rhodes and Joe Addy, who registered to vote on Election Day, and the Montana Life Defense Fund, are asking the Montana Supreme Court declare the outcome null and void, alleging the submission of CI-128 to voters was “constitutionally deficient (and) procedurally unsound.”
The Montana Family Foundation filed the case on June 9 directly with the Montana Supreme Court and asked it to accept jurisdiction given “urgency factors,” with the amendment to be enacted July 1.
“Make no mistake: This is a battle for the soul of Montana,” the Family Foundation said in an email to supporters. “If CI-128 stands, it will open the floodgates to unrestricted abortion and strip Montana of its ability to protect innocent life.”
The language of the initiative prohibits the government from denying or burdening the right to abortion “before fetal viability.”
The lawsuit was filed against the State of Montana, and last week, Republican Attorney General Austin Knudsen filed a notice on behalf of the state agreeing the state Supreme Court should take up the case, which he argued “presents issues of statewide importance.”
However, supporters of CI-128 requested to intervene in the case, arguing no one else in the case will represent their interests.
“The State of Montana forced proponents to litigate at every turn to protect Montanans’ constitutional initiative power,” they said in court documents.
The proposed intervenors are Dr. Samuel Dickman, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana, ACLU of Montana, and Forward Montana. They are represented by the Graybill Law Firm and ACLU of Montana.
“Proponents have an incontrovertible interest in defending the validity of CI-128 against Petitioner’s claims,” the group wrote in court documents. “Proponents drafted the petition, collected the signatures, prepared the ballot statement, and advocated for passage of the initiative.
“If this action were ‘dispos(ed) of’ in Petitioner’s favor, it would undo all of Proponents’ work, effectively reversing the results not only of the pre-election litigation but also a statewide election.”
This week in a court filing, the Montana Family Foundation said it did not object to participation by the intervenors given the position of the state, and it suggested “substantive briefing” could be helpful in the case.
It said the Montana Constitution requires “the full text of any proposed constitutional amendment to be submitted to the qualified electors on the ballot — not merely a short title, explanatory summary, or attorney general’s statement.”
The Montana Secretary of State publishes a voter information pamphlet, including the complete text of any Constitutional amendment, but that booklet is only distributed to registered voters on an active voter list “not later than 45 days before the election,” said the Montana Family Foundation in its petition.
That means Election-Day registrants don’t get those pamphlets, the plaintiffs said: “In other words, this class of qualified electors are deprived of the same opportunities to cast more-informed ballots compared to registered, active voters who appear on a county’s voter registration list more than 45 days prior to the election.”
As such, the Montana Family Foundation said the failure to include the full text of the amendment on the ballot violates the equal protection clause of the state and U.S. constitutions.
“As an Election-Day registrant, Rhodes was forced to cast a ballot without having an opportunity to read, evaluate or analyze the full text of CI-128,” said the court filing.
In a joint statement, supporters of CI-128 who asked to intervene in the case said they would continue to fight for access to abortion.
The statement was issued by ACLU of Montana Executive Director Akilah Deernose, Forward Montana Executive Director Alice Boyer, and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana CEO and President Martha Fuller.
“Everyone deserves the privacy and compassion to access the abortion care they need,” they said. “Montana voters agreed and made an informed decision when they decisively enshrined their right to abortion in the State Constitution.
“Anti-abortion extremists are showing a desperate display in an attempt to outright ignore the will of Montanans to enforce their unpopular, dangerous political agenda. We know that they will try anything to ban abortion — we, alongside our supporters, remain committed to fighting for Montanans and their families, and medical privacy free from government interference.”
Abortion in Montana remains legal, but landscape changed following Dobbs
By: Keila Szpaller - June 24, 2025
Although abortion remains generally legal in Montana, people on the frontlines in the Treasure State said work on the ground has changed since the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
In the 2022 Dobbs opinion, the nation’s highest court overturned Roe vs. Wade, which protected the right to abortion based on medical privacy.
Since then, laws criminalizing abortion took effect in Idaho, South Dakota, Texas and elsewhere, and staff at clinics in Montana are fielding more phone calls from people out of state with questions about medical care.
“What has changed is the intense heightening of fear and confusion,” said Helen Weems, owner of All Families Healthcare in Whitefish.
The Guttmacher Institute estimated 155,000 people traveled out of state for abortion care in 2024, or 15% of all abortion patients obtaining care in states without total bans. It said the number is a decline from 2023, but still represents an increase from the pre-Dobbs baseline of 81,000 in 2020.
And providers at Blue Mountain Clinic in Missoula have seen women from other states they feared were at risk of death, even as a report released this week identified women who died preventable deaths outside Montana due to complications after abortion bans took effect.
More people in Montana also need financial support, such as gas money to get to a clinic, according to the Montana Abortion Access Program.
In recent interviews, in advance of the third anniversary of the Dobbs decision, providers and advocates in Montana reflected on the changes they have seen in the field during the course of three years.
They also argued Montanans who support reproductive freedom should remain vigilant despite protections that remain in place in the Treasure State.
“The values of Montanans, everyday Montanans, continue to be that we strongly value our privacy, and we don’t want the government interfering in any way with our ability to make medical decisions,” said Nicole Smith, with Montanans for Choice.
Three years ago, millions of people in this country lost their right to access safe and timely abortion care, said Mary Sullivan, with Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana.
“Your access to care shouldn’t depend on where you live, and that’s what we have to continue fighting for is everyone having access to essential care,” Sullivan said.
In 1999, the Montana Supreme Court opinion in Armstrong vs. State of Montana found the state Constitution protected abortion based on privacy, similar to the rationale in Roe.
Since then, the state Supreme Court has found numerous laws attempting to restrict abortion unconstitutional based on the privacy protections in the Armstrong case.
Despite those protections, after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe, advocates for reproductive freedom in Montana collected signatures to place Constitutional Initiative 128 on the ballot last November, and voters approved the measure to specifically enshrine abortion protections in the state Constitution.
Earlier this month, the Montana Family Foundation announced it had sued the state of Montana over CI-128, alleging the state should have printed the entire amendment language on the ballot, and asking the amendment to be declared null and void.
The case is pending, even as the landscape for health care providers who offer abortion quietly, but significantly, shifts.
In 2024, the Montana Abortion Access Program served more clients and pledged more funding to help pay for abortions and travel than it did in its first 10 years combined, said executive director Erin Case.
The uptick started during the COVID-19 pandemic, grew after the Dobbs decision, and the need has continued to grow, she said, especially as people experience financial struggles.
“That increase has not stopped,” Case said.
Case said even though Montana is generally well served, with six clinics in the state that provide abortion care, including four operated by Planned Parenthood of Montana, access for patients in more rural areas can still be difficult.
Montana Abortion Access Program started in 2009, and it covers as little as $30 in travel support for a patient who needs to get to a clinic, she said. But in August 2024 and April 2025, the organization had record breaking demand, with 63 clients served each month.
In April, it pledged $24,549 toward the costs of abortion care and travel, the largest amount ever pledged in one month, Case said.
“The urgency for us is still there,” Case said. “There are still a lot of people accessing abortion care who need help.”
Since the Dobbs decision, women have died in the country from complications after abortion bans took effect, according to one of several reports released this week by Montanans for Choice. The report identified six documented cases whose families publicly shared stories.
It identified women in Texas and Georgia, citing reporting from The New Yorker and ProPublica. ProPublica said data is hard to come by, including because reviews are slow or even stalled.
In one case, a medical team failed to provide timely treatment for a miscarriage, and the woman died of an infection in a case experts described as “horrific,” said the report from Montanans for Choice. It said one woman passing blood clots during a miscarriage bled to death in a fatality more than 12 experts found to be preventable.
Tess Fields, executive director of the Blue Mountain Clinic in Missoula, said four months ago, a young woman from Idaho called the clinic for help because of the abortion ban in Idaho.
The woman was eight weeks pregnant and scheduled an appointment a couple of weeks out to arrange for time off work and the drive of seven hours, Fields said.
Then, she called the clinic again and reported cramping, bleeding and intense pain.
The woman refused the urging of Blue Mountain staff to go to the hospital, Fields said: “This person was absolutely terrified and said, ‘I can’t do that. I can’t tell them that I am scheduled to have an abortion in Montana. What if they arrest me?’”
The woman drove seven hours straight, in pain, bleeding and alone, to the Blue Mountain Clinic, and within 15 minutes of her arrival, providers learned she was experiencing an ectopic pregnancy, Fields said.
The condition is potentially fatal, she said, and Blue Mountain transported her to a local hospital, where she received emergency surgery.
“It’s about saving lives,” Fields said. “This person was so scared … of accessing health care in her own state, that that was the situation that she was put in. And she could have died on the way here, driving alone.”
The Dobbs decision means Blue Mountain Clinic is hearing from more pregnant people who need help, and Fields said it is poised to raise $1 million this year in order to add staff, including a provider.
Fields said she’s proud of the history of the clinic, which opened nearly 50 years ago as the first in Montana and one of the first in the nation to provide abortion care. It provides the full range of family practice medicine — wellness exams, vaccines, chronic pain management, more.
“In our view, that (full range) includes abortion care,” Fields said.
She’s also proud that one of its founders, the late Judy Smith, was instrumental in the case that became Roe vs. Wade at the U.S. Supreme Court; that supporters rebuilt a reinforced clinic after an arsonist firebombed it in 1993; that some of the art on display in the new building is made of relics of the fire, such as an old phone, repurposed by clinic patients.
Sullivan, of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana, said after Dobbs, opponents of abortion made “incredibly hostile attempts” to restrict it, but that isn’t the most enduring outcome she’s witnessed.
“What has changed the most is how fired up people are about their reproductive rights and just how much people do not want the government interfering in these decisions for them and their families,” Sullivan said.
She said CI-128 was one example: “The signatures turned in were a state record for any ballot issue in the state.”
She said the 2025 Montana Legislature was also the first time since the 1990s that an anti-abortion bill was defeated on the Senate floor.
Although abortion remains legal in Montana, Smith, with Montanans for Choice, said people still don’t have full reproductive freedom here.
Montanans passed CI-128, to enshrine abortion rights into the state Constitution, and it may be disputed at the Montana Supreme Court, but Smith said it only reaffirmed Roe vs. Wade.
“We all know that Roe v. Wade was never enough,” Smith said.
Montana allows for care up to fetal viability, typically 23 to 25 weeks, but she said so many people need care after viability, and those people have to leave the state.
Weems, with All Families Healthcare, said medication abortion needs to be protected as well. She said more than half of all abortions in the country take place by mail, and the number in Montana, a rural state, is the same or higher.
She said since Roe was overturned, maternal and fetal deaths have increased. She sees patients from Idaho too, and she said their fear is palpable.
“They are terrified to be pregnant because being pregnant in Idaho is dangerous,” Weems said.
The Dobbs decision also has had a chilling effect on obstetrics in general, she said. Fewer people are going into obstetrics training, she said, and fewer people will be trained in abortion in the future because they are being trained in states where abortion is banned.
“It will mean fewer providers (of abortion care),” Weems said.
Despite the bulwark the 1999 Armstrong case has provided to women seeking medical care, and the resounding 58% approval of CI-128, Smith and others said people who want to ensure reproductive freedom isn’t further eroded need to remain vigilant.
In particular, Smith said, legislation to grant “fetal personhood” criminalizes women for having a miscarriage or stillbirth, has been attempted in Montana, and it could be again, despite being out of alignment with the values of Montanans, she said.
Since the Dobbs decision, she said, the atrocities women have experienced in other states could happen in Montana without fighting to protect their rights.
“We will not tolerate it,” Smith said. “We will not stand it. Abortion bans are torture, and we have a long way to go to achieve true reproductive freedom in this state and in this country, and we believe pregnant people deserve care and support, not criminalization.”