AWHA Condemns Supreme Court Majority Opinion on Abortion Access

United States Supreme Court with cherry blossom tree in foreground by Bill Mason

A Way Home America is grieved and concerned by the Supreme Court majority opinion on last year’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health case that threatens to effectively overturn the protections secured by the Roe v. Wade ruling in 1973. We dedicate our work to ending the harmful effects that this ruling could have on people in vulnerable positions of housing instability. Youth and young adults experiencing homelessness will be adversely impacted by this decision in ways that will be detrimental to their immediate wellbeing and their long-term sustainability.

Young people experiencing homelessness contend with increased barriers to accessing healthcare including lack of coverage, cost, and unreliable transportation. This combined with increased mortality rates among BIPOC birthgivers means that unhoused young people can face compounding dangers during pregnancy and delivery. There is little existing support for pregnant people experiencing homelessness to have proper healthcare or preparation to become parents. 

The primary causes of youth and young adult homelessness involve the release of people from public systems including child welfare and juvenile detention, neither of which provide adequate support for young people to secure a stable dwelling or manage their own medical care. Our systems which have already failed to support young people adequately are now making unrealistic and discriminatory demands of this disadvantaged community. The enormous burden placed on already marginalized yong people worsens healthcare disparities and cycles of poverty.

Forcing young people with unwanted pregnancies to carry and deliver is a profoundly irresponsible response to circumstances largely caused by systemic inequities. This will only exacerbate the existing dangers imposed by the structures that neglect the needs of communities we serve. Our charge to lawmakers is to be accountable to our most vulnerable young people and honor the lived expertise of those experiencing homelessness. 

As A Way Home America remains dedicated to organizing and advocacy for The New Deal to End Youth Homelessness, we need our lawmakers to serve this critical cause as allies instead of adversaries to marginalized communities. While executive and legislative action to address the harms of this decision has come too late, The New Deal to End Youth Homelessness represents proactive visioning to help ensure young people’s rights and dignity. This opinion released by the Supreme Court is an overwhelming leap backward that perpetuates systemic cruelty against the populations we serve.