Part of Republican Texas state legislator Steve Toth’s anti-science, anti-choice bill that would ban the sale of drugs approved by the Food & Drug administration to induce abortions sits a provision that takes the GOP’s blooming fascism to a new level: the bill would require Internet Service Providers to block access to websites that provide information on “elective abortions” and prevent people from accessing websites that deal with women’s health.
HB 2690 would require ISPs to block access to sites including aidaccess.org, heyjane.co and other sites that facilitate the procurement and delivery of drugs like mifepristone, even though those sites also provide accurate medical information about abortion–information that debunks the information provided by conservatives and anti-choice adoption centers that pretend to be abortion providers. Like other anti-choice legislation in Texas, instead of directly outlawing the medical procedure, Toth wrote the bill to allow anyone sue anyone violating this law, in an effort to financially cripple information providers through hundreds of annoyance lawsuits and their associated fees.
“Each Internet service provider that provides Internet services in this state shall make every reasonable and technologically feasible effort to block Internet access to information or material intended to assist or facilitate efforts to obtain an elective abortion or an abortion-inducing drug, including information or material[,]” the bill reads.
Distinguished in Texas conservative circles for pushing a law through that protected 1,700 acres of land from development in a state famous for decrying government land grabs and zoning regulations–acreage that just coincidentally abutted his community in The Woodlands, thereby raising property values–Toth hits all the points on the MAGA scorecard: he questions election results; he violated state pandemic social distancing restrictions by getting a haircut in May 2020; and he wants to ban insurance companies from providing malpractice insurance to doctors who provide gender-affirming to any patient of any age, effectively preventing the doctors from practicing in Texas.
As Washington Republicans whine and cry about social media companies enforcing their terms of service on the threatening, misinformation and/or seditious posts of rude and violent conservatives–while incorrectly claiming that constitutes government censorship–Republicans like Toth and Florida Governor and go-go boot aficionado Ron DeSantis support laws that actually implement First Amendment-violating regulations censoring the speech of Americans.