LIHU‘E — Islanders spanned a Rice Street block on Friday, waving signs in protest of a leaked U.S. Supreme Court document targeting Roe v. Wade.
The bombshell filing, a draft majority opinion penned by Justice Samuel Alito, would nix a nearly 50-year-old ruling establishing a constitutional right to an abortion.
“We’re fighting for what generations have fought for in the past,” said Sasha Wozniak, one of about 20 demonstrators outside the Historic County Building from 4 to 6 p.m.
“We’ve never lived in a place where we’ve not had abortion or reproductive rights,” Wozniak continued. “I don’t want to go back. I don’t want to ever live in that.”
YWCA Kaua‘i, a nonprofit dedicated to women’s and other social issues, organized Friday’s sign-waving demonstration.
Local YWCA administrators, including County Councilmember KipuKai Kuali‘i and board member Claire Hummel, were among those protesting.
Hummel, a new mother, held a sign in one hand and minded her infant daughter with the other.
“It’s extremely important to raise my daughter in a world where my daughter has access to the health care that she needs, and also the right to choose,” Hummel said.
Kuali‘i, YWCA Kaua‘i’s director of operations, stood near the center of the protest with other nonprofit staff.
He was one of several men at the event.
“Women have to have control of their own bodies,” Kuali‘i said. “What the Supreme Court is trying to do now is pretty destructive and pretty much inhumane, to take us so far back to a place that we were so long past.”
The demonstration included medical and legal professionals in addition to YWCA staff and other community members.
Kaua‘i resident, demonstrator and attorney Jill Adams is the executive director of If/When/How, a national reproductive-rights organization.
If/When/How’s services include a free helpline that provides confidential legal advice, and a legal defense fund.
“(It) provides bail support and legal costs for people who get criminalized in relation to their pregnancy outcomes,” Adams said.
Staff of Hua Moon Women’s Health, a medical clinic in Kapa‘a, waved neon-green posters marked with pro-abortion rights slogans and their practice’s name and phone number.
Abortion is legal in Hawai‘i, a status that will not be directly affected by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
Hua Moon’s Sharon Offley, an advance practice registered nurse and certified nurse midwife, explained it’s possible to receive an abortion on Kaua‘i – within certain parameters.
On-island, a mail-ordered oral pill can be obtained and used no later than 10 weeks after conception, Offley said.
But a woman who wants an in-clinic abortion, or is beyond 10 weeks pregnant, needs to travel off-island.
Offley and her colleague, Colleen Bass, have worked with clients who have chosen abortion, and clients who have not.
Hua Moon’s clients have included survivors of rape, sexual assault and women informed of “profound” fetal anomalies, who have decided to terminate their pregnancies.
“We’ve also supported women who don’t offer us an explanation. They don’t owe us an explanation,” Offley said. “And we have women who want to continue their pregnancies, even if they’re facing challenges like domestic violence or illnesses like mental illness or addiction. If their choice is to have their babies, we support them in that. It’s their choice, not our choice.”
Abigail Naaykens, who works in social services with children on-island, protested alongside Wozniak and two other friends.
“Everything that I am passionate about involves the welfare of children. I don’t take that lightly,” Naaykens said. “All kids deserve to be wanted. Parenthood should be something that’s a choice, not something that’s forced upon anyone, because all children will become better adults when they get that love.”
Drivers held up shakas and sounded their car horns throughout the two-hour demonstration. The near-constant display of apparent support was interrupted by one male driver who held his thumb down, and another who shouted obscenities from his pickup truck.
