Walgreens, a well-known American pharmacy chain, dealt with extreme backlash this past weekend in the wake of an announcement that stated that it was going to not be selling abortion pills in states where the drugs remained legal after a group of close to two dozen Republican state attorney generals issued threats of possible legal action targeting the company.
Walgreens, which sits currently as the second-largest pharmaceutical chain to operate throughout the United States, expressed to Politico late last week that they would not be handling abortion pills either by mail or at locations in 21 states, which includes states where the drug is entirely legal such as Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, and Montana.
The choice came directly after a letter signed by well over 20 Republican attorneys general last month, who warned of violating state laws if the company elected to start mailing out abortion pills. A number of other pharmacies, such as Costco, CVS, and Walmart, were also issued a similar letter from those particular state officials.
“This is a very complex and in flux area of the law, and we are taking that into account as we seek certification,” explained a spokesman for Walgreens, Fraser Engerman, to The New York Times this past Friday.
Following the recent announcement, Business Insider issued a report stating that “Walgreens” and “#BoycottWalgreens” also started to trend on Twitter as a number of critics pushed for consumers to put a stop to their support of the pharmacy — which highlighted tweets coming from one of President Joe Biden’s aides, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, and Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL)– all of which seemingly was done to put pressure on the pharmacy to reverse its choice.
As a spokesperson for Students for Life, Kristi Hamrick heartily praised the choice made by Walgreens.
“This response indicates that pro-life concerns are being heard and that corporations are not rushing to take over the abortion business but are proceeding cautiously,” expressed Hamrick to Politico.
Students for Life, alongside a number of other pro-life groups, have issued their own letters to CVS and Walgreens in which they threatened “legal ramifications” for the companies if they started to fill prescriptions for these abortion pills, explained a report from Politico.
Other states that Walgreens included within its announcement were those that chose to make it entirely illegal to dispense the abortion pill through the mail which were: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia.
A spokesperson for Walgreens stated to Business Insider that it would continue to hand out the abortion pills “only in those jurisdictions where it is legal and operationally feasible.”