After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade on Friday, a new report from CNBC revealed that investment bank JPMorgan Chase will begin financing employees’ travel to other states as they try to procure abortions.
The 1973 opinion — which purported that abortion is protected under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution — was overturned through the court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. After Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion leaked in early May, several businesses began announcing that they would pay travel expenses for employees obtaining abortions.
JPMorgan Chase affirmed that it will fund employees’ travel to other states as they seek abortions beginning in July, according to a June 1 memo published on Friday by CNBC. The new benefits also apply to “family building benefits, such as cryopreservation.”
“We will also expand our existing health care travel benefit, which today covers certain services such as organ transplants, to all covered health care services that can only be obtained far from your home,” JPMorgan said.
The memo linked to a question-and-answer page asking, “Will you pay for an employee to travel to another state to seek an abortion if their state won’t allow them to get one?”
“Yes. Our health care plans have historically covered travel benefits for certain covered services that would require travel,” JPMorgan said. “Beginning in July, we will expand this benefit to include all covered services that can only be obtained far from your home, which would include legal abortion.”
Technology company Microsoft made a similar announcement earlier in May.
“Microsoft will continue to do everything we can under the law to protect our employees’ rights and support employees and their enrolled dependents in accessing critical health care — which already includes services like abortion and gender-affirming care — regardless of where they live across the U.S.,” Microsoft told The Washington Post. “This support is being extended to include travel expense assistance for these and other medical services where access to care is limited in availability in an employee’s home geographic region.”
Clothing manufacturer Levi Strauss said days after Alito’s opinion leaked that “business leaders need to make their voices heard and act to protect the health and well-being of our employees.”
“Under our current benefits plan, Levi Strauss & Co. employees are eligible for reimbursement for healthcare-related travel expenses for services not available in their home state, including those related to reproductive health care and abortion,” the company said in a press release.
E-commerce giant Amazon announced a similar move, while a report released by electric carmaker Tesla showed that the company added “travel and lodging support for those who may need to seek healthcare services that are unavailable in their home state” to its safety net and health insurance offerings last year.
In May, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) encouraged companies to provide travel expenses for workers procuring abortions, arguing that the overturn of Roe v. Wade would represent “the first time the court has taken back a freedom that was defined by precedent and respect for privacy.”
Likewise, Canadian Minister of Families Karina Gould said that Americans would be welcome to get abortions in her nation, saying that she was “concerned” about the implications of the Supreme Court’s decision for American and Canadian women.
Reporting from The Daily Wire.
