On Monday, a Tennessee Republican introduced a bill that aims to ban mailing abortion pills into the state. The “Unborn Child Protection Act of 2025,” or HB 26, would hold any individual or group that ships the medication liable for $5 million in damages. Tennessee currently enforces a total, criminal abortion ban.
HB 26, introduced by state Rep. Gino Bulso (R), would attach a highly costly civil penalty to abortion access in the state on top of the criminal ban. The first-of-its-kind bill poses a potential threat to shield laws, which protect doctors and health care providers who prescribe and send abortion pills to patients in states that ban abortion from facing criminal charges and legal repercussions. (Massachusetts, Washington, Colorado, Vermont, New York, and California all have these laws.)
Speaking to local news station News 2, Bulso said he filed HB 26 after he “learned that there were some young ladies in Tennessee who had ordered and received abortion pills through the mail.” He also suggested the bill isn't extreme because the state’s wrongful death statute already includes “unborn children.”
Bulso further specified that his bill would allow family members of people who receive abortion pills to sue a wide range of entities, such as the drug manufacturers, delivery services, pro-choice volunteer networks, and even other family members and loved ones who help someone access pills by mail. He told News 2 that his bill “addresses a problem that we’ve got right now in Tennessee where you have manufacturers and distributors who are mailing abortion pills into Tennessee, despite the fact that it’s unlawful to do that.” Except… it is lawful—right now, at least. Bulso hasn’t addressed the matter of shield laws and didn’t respond to a request for clarification from Jezebel.
HB 26 supposedly only cracks down on mifepristone and misoprostol — the two most common abortion pills — for abortion, and not the other purposes the pills are routinely used for, such as miscarriage management and postpartum hemorrhaging. But it would obviously jeopardize these medications coming into the state for any reason.
He further explained to the Tennessean that he intends “to deter folks from breaking the law and to provide a civil remedy to the family of an unborn child who's killed because abortion pills were illegally sent into the state.” Again, mailing pills into the state remains perfectly legal right now, but HB 26 is an eerie warning shot at shield laws, which have thus far been vital to protecting some level of abortion access in abortion-banned states like Tennessee.
Bulso also made the head-spinning argument that $5 million in damages is "a reasonable amount," considering "both the economic and noneconomic value of the life of an unborn child who did not even have the opportunity to survive outside the womb." Ashley Coffield, CEO of Planned Parenthood of Tennessee and North Mississippi, warned that HB 26 is a fetal personhood bill, telling the Tennessean that it's a "a worst case scenario." In February, the Alabama Supreme Court similarly determined that embryos are "extrauterine children" eligible for wrongful death lawsuits under state laws, which temporarily resulted in fertility clinics suspending IVF services across the state.
Since being elected to the Tennessee legislature in 2022, Bulso, a career personal injury lawyer, has legislated extensively against abortion and trans rights, and in 2023 co-sponsored the resolution to expel state Rep. Justin Jones, a Democrat who led protests for gun safety measures at the state Capitol. The resolution succeeded, but Jones was soon reinstated.
The organization Plan C Pills, which helps people in all 50 states access abortion pills by mail via its website, called HB 26 “a desperate political attempt" to shutter abortion access in a statement to Jezebel, and emphasized that abortion pills have "been proven to be a safe, effective, and common practice throughout the United States.” In March, Aid Access, which also helps people get abortion pills by mail, placed abortion-pill dispensing robots outside the Supreme Court. "Shield laws will continue to protect providers," Founder Rebecca Gomperts told Jezebel at the time.
"No amount of threat or fear will be successful in stopping abortion pills from entering Tennessee by mail," Plan C said. "As has been demonstrated in other states that have enacted barriers to abortion access, clinicians, volunteers, and e-commerce sites will continue to help abortion seekers in Tennessee access this basic medical care."
