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For Immediate Release
September, 27 2010, 12:47pm EDT
Contact:
Robyn Shepherd, ACLU National, (212) 519-7829 or 549-2666; media@aclu.org
Robert Doody, ACLU of South Dakota, (605) 332-2508
ACLU Sues for Information on American Indian Women Pressured to Induce Labor
Pregnant Women on South Dakota Reservation Denied Freedom to Make Medical Decisions
PIERRE, S.D.
The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of South Dakota filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit today against Indian Health Services (IHS) seeking information about reports that pregnant women on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation are being pressured into taking medication to induce labor against their wishes. The FOIA lawsuit also seeks information on plans to build a birthing unit on the reservation, funded in large part with federal stimulus dollars.
"A woman living on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation has the same rights as any other woman to make medical decisions during pregnancy," said Alexa Kolbi-Molinas, staff attorney with the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project. "No woman should be compelled to undergo induced labor against her will."
There is no obstetric care available on the reservation, the fourth largest in the United States. Although plans to build an obstetric care facility on the reservation have been pending since 2002, construction has not moved beyond its earliest stages despite an appropriation from Congress last year to finish the facility. Since most women on the reservation depend on IHS for healthcare, they are forced to travel 90 miles to St. Mary's Healthcare Center in Pierre for labor and delivery, the nearest facility with an IHS contract.
Many women are simply told that they must have their labor induced on a particular day without being given any information about the risks and benefits of induction, any discussion of their options or any choice in the matter. Many of the women undergo the forced inductions because they are dependent on IHS for their healthcare and feel they have no option but to comply, creating an inherently coercive situation. Making the situation even worse, because of the distance between the hospital and the reservation, if the women of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe are induced without any prior notice, they may not be able to have their family with them during labor and delivery or to make sure their affairs are looked after while they are hospitalized.
"It is bad enough that these women are denied basic healthcare services on their own reservation," said Robert Doody, staff attorney with the ACLU of South Dakota. "They should not also feel bullied into being induced at a time that is convenient for their doctor, and sacrifice the right to decide how to give birth."
The federal lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York after IHS failed to respond in a timely manner to ACLU FOIA requests submitted in November 2009 for the documents, as mandated by law. The lawsuit seeks a court order requiring the agency to make the requested documents publicly available.
Concerns about the quality of IHS services have prompted a Senate investigation into what the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs has called "serious cases of mismanagement, malfeasance, retaliation against whistleblowers as well as potential criminal behavior" occurring in South Dakota, as well as other states. The committee will hold a hearing on Tuesday to explore these allegations. The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs will be broadcasting Tuesday's hearing at indian.senate.gov/hearings/hearing.cfm?hearingID=4834
The complaint can be viewed at: www.aclu.org/reproductive-freedom/aclu-v-indian-health-services-complai...
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
(212) 549-2666LATEST NEWS
Trump-Appointed Judges Give Him Green Light to Send Troops Into Portland
In a dissent, Judge Susan Graber accused her 9th Circuit colleagues of eroding "core constitutional principles."
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Two federal judges are giving President Donald Trump the green light to send National Guard troops into Portland, Oregon on Monday.
The US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit granted the US Department of Justice's (DOJ) request to put a hold on US District Judge Karin Immergut's earlier order blocking deployment of the National Guard to Oregon's largest city.
The two judges who ruled in the DOJ's favor were appointed by Trump, while the lone dissenter in the case, Judge Susan Graber, was appointed by former President Bill Clinton.
The court's majority ruled that the protests outside the Portland Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility were sufficiently disruptive to justify deploying the National Guard, despite the fact that demonstrations outside the facility in recent weeks had not disrupted operations.
Judge Ryan Nelson, one of the Trump appointees, went so far as to issue a concurring opinion stating that the president's right to deploy the National Guard, even over the objections of state and local officials, cannot be reviewed by the judiciary.
In a scathing dissent, Graber noted that "the record contains no evidence whatsoever that, on September 27... ICE was unable either to protect its Portland facility or to execute the immigration laws it is charged with enforcing." This is relevant, she said, because the law states that the president may only deploy the National Guard "to repel a foreign invasion, quell a rebellion, or overcome an inability to execute the laws."
Graber then accused her colleagues of eroding "core constitutional principles, including sovereign states’ control over their states’ militias and the people’s First Amendment rights to assemble and to object to the government’s policies and actions."
Graber's argument echoed a ruling made earlier this month by Immergut, who was also appointed to the bench by Trump and who said his declarations that violent protests at the Portland ICE facility prevented the enforcement of the law were "untethered to facts."
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As voters sour on Israel after over two years of genocide in Gaza, an internal poll suggests that backing from the pro-Israel lobby may be a liability for Democrats seeking to win their primaries.
The Democratic polling firm Upswing Strategies canvassed 850 Democratic voters in congressional districts across Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania. The survey asked voters for some of the most competitive Democratic primaries in the 2026 election cycle a number of questions about their sympathies in the Israel-Palestine conflict.
It also zeroed in on their feelings about pro-Israel lobbying groups, including the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which supported 152 Democrats who received more than $28 million in total during the 2024 election and had a role in toppling several House progressives, including then-Reps. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) and Jamaal Bowman (D-NY).
The poll found that nearly half of voters in these competitive districts (48%) agreed with the statement that they "could never support" a candidate for Congress that was funded by AIPAC or the pro-Israel lobby more generally. Over a quarter of voters, 28%, said they strongly felt they could never support a candidate backed by AIPAC.
Just 40% said they "could see" themselves supporting a candidate backed by AIPAC, "especially if I agreed with them on most other issues," but just 10% expressed that belief strongly, while the other 30% said they only agreed with it somewhat.
The poll was posted to social media by Matthew Eadie, a reporter for the Illinois news outlet Evanston Now, on Saturday. He said that since it was conducted in early September, its results have been "circulating among Democrats in over a half-dozen competitive primaries in mostly Illinois."
With Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin's seat coming open in 2026, several current Illinois congresspeople have signaled their intent to run, leaving their own House seats up for grabs. Among them are some AIPAC favorites, including Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), who received over $63,000 from pro-Israel groups during the 2023-24 election cycle and nearly $269,000 since his first campaign in 2016; and Rep. Robin Kelly (D-Ill.), who received over $17,000 last cycle and nearly $109,000 since her first campaign in 2012.
Pro-Israel groups will also likely seek to hold off yet another primary challenge to Rep. Danny Davis (D-Ill.) from the progressive community organizer Kina Collins, who has run against him during the last three cycles. During the 2024 election, an AIPAC affiliate, the United Democracy Project, spent approximately half a million dollars running ads attacking Collins, who had described Israel's actions against Palestinians, including its blockade of food and water supplies, as "war crimes."
Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.), a progressive who has referred to Israel's actions as a "genocide" and sponsored a bill to halt military aid to the nation, was targeted with more than $157,000 worth of digital ads and mailers in 2022 by the AIPAC ally Democratic Majority for Israel. However, in 2024, while blitzing other races, the groups held off on targeting Ramirez, whose support was deemed to be too strong.
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This wane is partially due to the collapse of support for Israel among Democrats over the past two years. Affirming what past polls have shown, the Upswing poll found that Democratic voters overwhelmingly have a wildly positive view of not only Palestine, but international organizations that have shown support to Palestinians like the United Nations and Doctors Without Borders, while having overwhelmingly negative views of Israel and especially its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
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A 55-year-old woman had to be hospitalized after being knocked unconscious by a baton-wielding masked Israeli settler on Sunday.
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As reported by Middle East Eye, several attacks were reported in the town of Turmus Ayya, where Israeli settlers targeted Palestinian farmers and international volunteers who had come to help with the harvest.
One of the victims in the assault was a 55-year-old Palestinian woman named Umm Saleh Abu Alia, whom BBC reports had to be hospitalized after being knocked unconscious by a baton-wielding masked settler. Abu Alia was initially admitted into an intensive care unit, and she is currently in stable condition, according to BBC's sources.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) released a statement saying it "strongly condemns any form of violence" by settlers, but Jasper Nathaniel, a US journalist who filmed the attacks, told BBC that Israeli forces suspiciously "sped off" away from the area shortly before the assault began.
Nathaniel told Drop Site News that settlers are "hunting Palestinians" in the town.
⚡️Exclusive | Drop Site News speaks with journalist Jasper Nathaniel (@infinite_jaz), who documented a brutal settler attack today in Turmus’ayyer village near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. Jasper tells us Israeli settlers are “hunting Palestinians” — and that if nothing… https://t.co/DP6h89XJCz pic.twitter.com/q6OvvtEp8u
— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) October 19, 2025
BBC's report noted that more than a dozen masked Israeli settlers were seen throwing rocks at Palestinians during the Sunday harvest, and Middle East Eye cited reports that the settlers had also set Palestinians' cars on fire and stole their olive crops.
According to The Times of Israel, no arrests have yet been made of any of the settlers who took part in the attacks.
Israeli settlers, who under international law are living illegally in occupied territory, have for years carried out attacks on Palestinian civilians harvesting olives in an attempt to drive them from their lands—sometimes with the participation of IDF soldiers.
Middle East Eye reports that the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission estimates there have been more than 7,000 settler attacks on Palestinians over the last two years that have claimed the lives of 33 people.
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