Mailing abortion drugs to patients would be a crime under a bill the Mississippi Legislature passed to define the practice as felony drug trafficking. Under an amended version of House Bill 1613, doctors or providers who prescribe or distribute abortion-inducing drugs, like mifepristone and misoprostol, without an in-person visit with a patient could face imprisonment and civil penalties.
“In 2024, Louisiana also took similar steps to criminalize abortion medication, and it has wreaked havoc on access to abortion care, pregnancy care, fertility care, and other medical care that relies on mifepristone and misoprostol in the state,” Reproductive Freedom for All said in a March 6 press release. “If Mississippi passes a law similar to its neighboring state, miscarriage care, postpartum care, and abortion care provided under the state’s existing narrow exceptions will be similarly difficult to access, which could lead to devastating consequences.”
H.B. 1613 originally said that a person possessing 200 or more grams of illegal drugs would constitute an aggravated drug trafficking charge, Mississippi House Judiciary B Chairman Rep. Kevin Horan, R-Grenada, said on the House floor on Feb. 11.
Mississippi House Rep. Celeste Hurst, R-Sandhill, introduced an amendment to add “abortion-inducing drugs” to the list of illegal substances under the drug trafficking statutes in Mississippi Code Section 41-29-139.
The most common use of abortion-inducing drugs is for pregnant people who are going through a miscarriage. Doctors prescribe the drug and supervise the process. Hurst told the Mississippi Free Press that the intention of her amendment is to ensure patient safety by clarifying that it is illegal under state law for doctors to prescribe those medications without an in-person visit from a patient.
“Right now, it’s being mailed out without any doctor oversight and without any age verification whatsoever—they’re not even verifying if the person they’re communicating with via form is a woman,” she told the Mississippi Free Press on Feb. 16.
Hurst clarified that her amendment would not punish people who receive the abortion-inducing drugs illicitly from doctors; it would only affect the doctors or prescribers.
Violators could face imprisonment at the Mississippi Department of Corrections for one to 10 years under the legislation. The Mississippi attorney general could also enforce civil penalties for the offender “to obtain declaratory or injunctive relief, and to recover civil penalties and costs,” the amendment explains.
When the House bill came over to the Senate, Sen. Joey Fillingane, R-Sumrall, amended the legislation to say that a person possessing 267 grams or more of illegal drugs would constitute an aggravated drug trafficking charge, which was noted in a similar Senate bill. The Senate approved the amendment.
Sen. Derrick Simmons, D-Greenville, clarified with Fillingane that the language adding the abortion drug trafficking provision came from the House, not the Senate.
The House passed the legislation by a 77-39 vote on Feb. 11, and the Senate passed it by a 24-7 vote on March 6. Nine senators voting against the bill paired their votes with nine senators who voted in favor of the bill. The paired votes are not part of the vote total.