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Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance are currently accepting applications for their Boards of Directors!

We encourage you to apply if you’re passionate about protecting and advancing reproductive rights, increasing access to reproductive health care — especially abortion care — pursuing policy changes that support abortion access, and value reproductive justice and autonomy for communities across our state.

What do you need to know about joining the Abortion Forward or the Abortion Forward Alliance board?

Abortion Forward, a 501(c)(4) organization, and Abortion Forward Alliance, a 501(c)(3) organization, are grounded in the principles of reproductive justice. We are working to maintain and expand abortion access in Ohio. We are looking for board members who are interested in engaging in this strategic work and support this next phase of our work. If you’re interested and willing to roll up your sleeves and get to work, we need you!

The boards and their members have specific roles and associated responsibilities as the two organizations’ governing bodies. Learn more about this in the position description below.

We welcome applications from all who are interested in supporting Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance through board service. It is helpful for us to have board members with a variety of specific skills, expertise, and lived experience. If you have any expertise in these areas, please include this information in your application: HR, accounting, fundraising, PR and media, business and financial planning, organizing, advocacy, electoral politics (ideally in the reproductive health, rights, and justice sector but any and all social justice expertise is welcome). We are also committed to the inclusion of people who are deeply connected to the following communities: Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), LGBTQ+, people living with disabilities, people in rural communities, and those in Southwest Ohio and Southeast Ohio.

Ready to apply? Please fill out this application form and have two reference forms completed on your behalf. We are accepting rolling applications through October 31, 2025 with the goal of onboarding new Board members in January 2026 with the expectation of attending the March board meeting.

If you have any questions, please email board@abortionforward.org.

We hope that you’ll consider applying to join one of our boards and thank you for your continued support for Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance!

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Abortion Forward/Abortion Forward Alliance
Board of Directors Position Description

Board members shall:
● Be committed to the missions of Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance.
Attend four 4-hour board meetings per year (2 virtual and 2 in person), monthly planning meetings (1 hour), and other committee meetings and training as necessary.
● Assist in developing policies and understand their responsibility to help carry out the agreed upon goals.
● Be accountable to and supportive of other board members enabling one another to fulfill board commitments.
● Be a spokesperson in the community for Abortion Forward and/or Abortion Forward Alliance as needed.
● Approve and monitor the annual budget and monthly financial reports and ensure adequate financial resources.
● Help with the fundraising efforts for Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance fundraising efforts. This can include donating or raising money, helping solicit other gifts or identifying potential donors, participating in fundraising events and volunteering time to the organization. Overall, we ask for our board to be a high priority in your charitable giving.
● Participate in and monitor strategic planning.
● Participate on at least one committee: Current committees include Governance, Board Development, Human Resources/Personnel, Finance, Fundraising/Development, and Political Action Committee.
● Promote diversity, equity and inclusion within the organization.
● Nominate/supply names of prospective new board members.
● Recruit new supporters and volunteers.
● Represent the organization with a values-aligned approach.
● Build supportive working relationships with staff.
● Participate in hiring and firing the Executive Director.
● Participate in supporting and evaluating the Executive Director.
● Ensure legal and ethical integrity.
● Adhere to the conflict of interest, confidentiality and other policies of the organization.

Board Expectations
Board Members can expect to spend approximately 3-5 hours per month on board work including active participation in meetings, calls, and committees. Additionally, board members are expected to communicate their ability to attend meetings, calls, and committees to the Board President.

Board terms are three years. Each Board Member is expected to serve a minimum of one full term.

As a governing board, the board of directors is not involved with the day-to-day operations of Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance. That work is overseen by the Executive Director and executed by staff. Board Members at Abortion Forward and Abortion Forward Alliance are expected to be responsive to and provide strategic guidance to the Executive Director, and assist with fundraising, raising visibility, and deepening community connections to the organization.

Accountability
Missing more than two quarterly board meetings, without communication to the Board President, annually for any reason may be grounds for dismissal from the board.

Board Officer Roles and Responsibilities
Each board has officers: a President, Vice President, Secretary, and Treasurer. Both the Secretary and Treasurer sit on both the c3 and c4 boards. Officer Terms are one year.

Board President
The President is responsible for calling for and presiding over board meetings, executive committee meetings, and overseeing the Board of Directors and board policies and actions. The President serves as the primary contact for any board issues that may arise and sets goals and objectives with the Board and ensures that they are met. Additionally, the President is the board’s official spokesperson and serves as an ex-officio member of any ad hoc board committees.

Vice President
The Vice President is responsible for assuming the President’s duties in their absence. Additionally, they are tasked with working with the Executive Director for all Board at-large and officer nominations and elections.

Treasurer
The Treasurer serves as the primary financial officer of the organization and, in collaboration with the Executive Director or another designated staff person, is responsible for reviewing monthly financial reports, providing timely financial reports to the Board of Directors, ensures the submission of tax and legal compliance reports to the appropriate government entities, and oversees the annual audit and budget processes.

Secretary
The Secretary is responsible for recording, maintaining, and disseminating the organization’s records, such as Board meeting minutes and other relevant organizational documents. Additionally, the secretary is responsible for conducting all votes taken (mail, email, verbal) during board business, and sharing this information with the Executive Director.

On September 22, 2025, Abortion Forward Communications Director Gabriel Mann testified against the Republican plan to redraw Ohio’s congressional districts.

Before he read his prepared remarks, Gabriel added some clarifying notes for the committee in response to misinformation heard earlier in the hearing:

Thank you, Madam Chair. There is a deadline!

The Ohio Constitution, Article XIX, Section 1 (D) 

“Not later than the last day of September of the year after the year in which a plan expires under division (C)(3)(e) of this section, the general assembly shall pass a congressional district plan in the form of a bill by the affirmative vote of three-fifths of the members of each house of the general assembly, including the affirmative vote of at least one-half of the members of each of the two largest political parties represented in that house. A congressional district plan that is passed under this division and becomes law shall remain effective until the next year ending in the numeral one, except as provided in Section 3 of this article.”

These are rules Speaker Matt Huffman helped write and sponsored in a bill that is now codified into our state constitution!

The Republican-led ballot board did write the ballot language in 2024, just like they did in 2023. Secretary LaRose abused that privilege both times. 

Gerrymandering also impacts statewide races. 

There’s been so many people in this hearing reading dictionary definitions of gerrymandering, but nowhere near enough discussing the fact that you all are making government worse.

It’s gerrymandering when you produce bad policies that hurt people.

It’s gerrymandering when you lock in elections before voters get to vote. 

It’s gerrymandering when those elected officials don’t listen to voters because they weren’t picked by voters.

I’m here to illustrate one specific bad outcome that is a direct result of a broken redistricting process, because our current maps our gerrymandered.

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Gabriel’s prepared testimony, as written by our Deputy Director, Jaime Miracle:

Gabriel Mann, Communications Director 
Joint Committee on Congressional Redistricting 
September 22, 2025 

Co-Chairs Timkin & Bird and members of the Joint Committee on Congressional Redistricting, thank you for accepting my testimony today. My name is Gabriel Mann, and I am the communications director for Abortion Forward, formerly Pro-Choice Ohio. I am here today urging you to pass a congressional district map that represents the people of Ohio, like the maps submitted by the Senate Democrats or the OCRC-drawn map that the Equal Districts coalition re-submitted. 

In 2023, we saw a clear example of why gerrymandered districts fail to represent the views of the voters’ elected officials are supposed to be representing. Fifty-seven percent of the voters that cast ballots in November 2023 voted in favor of the Ohio Reproductive Freedom Amendment, enshrining the right to abortion and other reproductive health care services in the Ohio Constitution. Why did the voters have to do that? Because for over a decade the gerrymandered Ohio Legislature had been going against their will enacting more than 30 bans and restrictions on abortion. Not only did voters have to go to the ballot, collecting hundreds of thousands of signatures, to get the measure qualified to appear on the ballot, but the same voters had to come out and vote in a special election just months before the November election to fight back a legislatively created constitutional amendment solely focused on making the November election impossible to win. This gerrymandered Ohio Legislature has one goal: rigging the process in their favor because they cannot win based on the merits of their arguments. You know the policies you are passing do not represent the will of the people, you read the same polling I do. 

In 2024, 5.8 million Ohioans came out to vote in the November general election. Fifty-five percent of those voted for the Republican candidate for president. Forty-four percent of them voted for the Democratic candidate for president. A representative map for Ohio should be one that comes close to those numbers, giving Ohioans from both parties the representation that matches the state composition. Our current congressional map gives Ohioans 10 Republican and 5 Democratic seats in congress, a 67% to 33% breakdown far from the representational number of 55% to 45%. 

In the United States, we have a representative democracy—the people elect individuals to represent the needs of our communities in government. Unfortunately, states like Ohio have strayed from this foundational principle, creating district boundaries not based upon representation, but biased to a single party to win elections. The very foundation of our democracy is at risk when the people of our state no longer have true representation from their elected officials.   

I am disappointed that this hearing is the first and likely only hearing before the first deadline in this redistricting process. We have not yet even seen a proposed map from the Republican leaders in the legislature. Leaders are making no attempt to work in a bipartisan manner to do what is best for Ohio, which would be to pass representational bipartisan maps before the September 30^th deadline.  

The map submitted by the Democrats and the OCRC drawn map re-submitted by the Equal Districts Coalition both meet both the spirit and the letter of the 2018 voter-approved constitutional reform. We encourage this committee and the legislature to adopt one of these maps for bipartisan passage before September 30^th to give Ohioans what they deserve: a representative democracy where the voices and needs of their communities are heard.  

Ohioans deserve true representation in our government. When we don’t get good maps, Ohioans lose, communities lose.   

The state budget process in Ohio this year was long, confusing, and frankly one of the cruelest examples of how far our legislature will go to score points with their political base while simultaneously screwing over people in our state. We’ll have more to share about the final version of the bill next week. But recently some news was released that stopped us in our tracks: the final version of the state budget gave the Department of Children and Youth less funding for various programs and certain goals were having to be adjusted.  

One of the goals listed for adjustment was Ohio’s dismal infant mortality rate. Under the initial version of the budget proposed by Governor DeWine, their goal was to reduce the rate from 7.1 per 1,000 births to 4.4 per 1,000 births. But because of the cuts the legislature made to the Governor’s budget, that goal was instead reduce from 7.1 to 6 deaths per 1,000 births. The so-called “pro-life” party reduced program funding to the point where the department had to reduce the number of lives that could be saved. How “pro-life” of them! 

Rates are hard to picture, so let’s do some math: In 2024, there were 123,745 births in Ohio. At the current infant mortality rate (7.1 per 1,000 live births) that means approximately 879 babies tragically died before their first birthday. If the department’s initial goal of reducing the rate to 4.4 per 1,000 was achieved, that number would drop to 544. But with the revised goal of 6 per 1,000, we will only reduce that number to 742. Hundreds more babies could be at risk for death because the legislature cut the funding for this program by more than $26 million dollars over the next two years. According to the CDC Ohio ranks in the bottom 10 states for infant mortality rates. This has been a crisis for a long time now – and our legislature continues to underfund and ignore it.  

But Jaime, you say, the state just doesn’t have that money to spend! Well, my friend, that is where you are wrong, because the state spent nearly the exact same amount ($25 million) funding anti-abortion fake health centers, also known as CPCs. Five million of those dollars are giving high tech ultrasound machines to these centers who do not have the expertise or staff to properly use them. A good friend of mine likes to say that “budgets are moral documents”. They show where the priorities are for the legislators who write and pass them. In giving $25 million dollars to centers who peddle misinformation and shame while leaving real providers and trusted community programs with pennies and a prayer, the Ohio legislature has made their priorities abundantly clear – and our wellbeing is at the bottom of the list. 

Want to learn more about the harms caused by CPCs? Check out our latest research and information You can also check out some great new research from the Reproductive Health and Freedom Watch about the dangers of these centers conducting non-medical, non-diagnostic ultrasounds on people with untrained staff. Spoiler alert: a CPC in Massachusetts was sued because they endangered the life of a pregnant woman when they misdiagnosed an ectopic pregnancy. Yes, that’s right – the state of Ohio is giving fake health centers $5 million in funding to get fancy 3D ultrasound machines that could risk the health and well-being of the people who go to these centers for help.    

Want to do more? Talk to your friends and family about the dangers of CPCs! Attend one of our upcoming Ramp Up for Repro trainings and learn how you can combat misinformation and abortion stigma.  

Jaime Miracle, Deputy Director
Senate Medicaid Committee
Testimony in Opposition to HB 96
May 15, 2025

Chair Romanchuk, Vice Chair Huffman, Ranking Member Liston, and members of the Senate Medicaid Committee, thank you for accepting my testimony in opposition to House Bill 96, the proposed state budget. My name is Jaime Miracle, and I am the deputy director for Abortion Forward, formerly Pro-Choice Ohio. Before I begin, I want to thank my Policy Fellow Milena Wood for her assistance with drafting this testimony I’m presenting today.

We have many concerns about the Medicaid portions of the state budget, including limits to doula coverage, the defunding of Medicaid mental health providers who are gender affirming, elimination of continuous coverage for children from birth through age three, banning DEI programming in the Medicaid program, and the trigger language that will kick over 700,000 Ohioans off their health insurance by eliminating the expansion group coverage.

A budget document is a moral document – showing the direction that the state’s elected officials want to go for the next two years. As currently pending, the only signal that this budget is sending to Ohioans is that this legislature unfortunately continues to push cruel and harmful policies on the residents of our great state.

DOULA MEDICAID COVERAGE LIMITS

I’ll will start with the limits to the newly created Medicaid coverage for doula services. This program was implemented less than a year ago, and it is unfathomable to me why this legislature would be acting so quickly to gut this critical program. Doulas are an essential resource by virtue of the emotional and physical support they provide during pregnancy, labor, and the postpartum period, helping to improve the overall birth experience and birth outcomes for both mom and the baby. Non-white women in particular are more vulnerable to poorer health outcomes, especially during the birthing process, and these disparities in care often manifest in higher cesarean rates among non-white women.1 Black women contend with higher rates of cesarean deliveries and the effects of provider biases on treatment protocols than white women.2 A 2018 report found that “black women are losing their infants” on account of aforementioned factors like provider bias higher cesarean rates “ at a greater rate than any other racial/ethnic group in the nation.”3 They continue, “considering that the black preterm birth rate and the black rate of cesarean sections for delivery exceed those of other groups, addressing these factors could decrease the gap between black and white infant mortality rates.” One such method to decrease that gap easily are doulas. Research shows that having a doula can lead to better birth outcomes, such as fewer cesarean sections and less anxiety for the birthing person.4 This is especially true for Black and non-white women.  

For vulnerable populations, having access to a doula can mean the difference between a healthy, stress-free birth and a traumatic birthing experience. This budget limits the funding to $500,000 per year, allowing only 416 births per year to have a doula covered by Medicaid, a wholly inadequate number considering approximately 60,000 births each year are paid for by Medicaid. In other words, only 0.6% of all births will be able to have this life-saving care. Attempting to make Ohio the best place to raise a family must also include making it a place where those who want to start a family have the resources and support necessary to do so. We urge the Senate to allow this program to reach its full potential and not limit it before it has even had a chance. Eliminate the restrictions on Medicaid coverage for doulas and ensure that everyone who is covered by Medicaid has access to these critical, life-saving services.

DEFUNDING MEDICAID MENTAL HEALTH PROVIDERS

Ohio, like the rest of the country, is in the midst of a mental health crisis. Getting access to mental health care can be a real struggle, especially for those who rely on Medicaid for their health insurance coverage. The provision in this bill that would force mental health providers to choose between being able to be a Medicaid provider and being able to serve every patient who comes through the door with the dignity and respect that they deserve is cruel and will cause harm to people across this state. No matter how many bills you introduce or policies you try to push, transgender people exist, have always existed, and will continue to exist long after you are out of office. This legislation is poised to cause great harm to Ohio’s transgender community. Please listen to the stories of transgender Ohioans who have come before this committee to share their stories. Limiting access to healthcare that affirms the basic dignity of humanity and identity will lead to more Ohioans attempting suicide. This provision, plus the provision mirroring the Trump executive order defining only two sexes, and the defunding of youth homelessness programs that affirm a person’s gender identity show just how little regard the Ohio legislature has for residents of our state. We urge you to strike this and the other dangerous and cruel anti-Trans provisions out of this budget document.

ELIMINATION OF CONTINUOUS MEDICAID ENROLLMENT FOR CHIDREN THROUGH AGE 3

The elimination of the program that ensures continuous Medicaid coverage for children from birth through age three would have grave consequences for families in our state. You cannot claim to care about young children and then deny them the chance to have a healthy start in life. This program is critical.

Navigating frequent income checks and eligibility reviews can often leave these young children with gaps in coverage. These gaps mean they miss important well-child visits, care for chronic illnesses like asthma, or critical vaccinations. This program also relieves the stress on the parents by ensuring continuity of healthcare coverage that might otherwise be lapsed due to circumstances like a small temporary increase in household income or a missed piece of mail. Research has shown that stable healthcare access in early childhood leads to better long-term health outcomes. Providing this coverage puts that child on the path to a healthy life for their lifespan, not just the four years they are ensured Medicaid coverage. We urge this committee to allow this program to continue and ensure that our youngest Ohioans have access to the healthcare they need to grow into healthy teens and adults.

MEDICAID EXPANSION “TRIGGER” LANGUAGE

In Ohio, the Medicaid expansion provides health insurance coverage to approximately 770,000 people. This group includes people who have incomes that are too high to qualify for traditional Medicaid, but too low to qualify for coverage on the health insurance exchange. The elimination of the Medicaid expansion does not only impact the individuals and families who will lose critical health care coverage but will also have devastating impacts on hospitals across the state, especially in rural counties in Ohio.

According to the March of Dimes, 2.2% of all babies born to women in Ohio live in rural counties, while only 0.2% of maternity care providers practice in rural counties. Thirteen counties in our state are considered maternity care deserts, meaning there are no hospitals or birth centers offering obstetric care in those counties. Immediate termination of the Medicaid expansion as outlined in the “trigger” language of this budget bill would cause all of these rates to rise and our hospitals systems to struggle to care for patients in their community. Please eliminate the hard “trigger” language currently in H.B. 96. Replace the “shall” to “may” to allow the state to fully examine the impacts of changing federal support, and weigh that with the loss of coverage and impacts on our healthcare system.

MEDICAID DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION BAN

The House proposal also includes language that bans the Department of Medicaid from using “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” in its work. The lack of definitions around what this prohibition could mean leaves the department without clear guidance on what they can and cannot do, increasing the likelihood of over-enforcement to ensure compliance. Removing the ability for the department to look at disease trends by race or how certain health outcomes look different in different populations across our state will make the work of medical professionals more difficult and cause our already high levels of racial disparities in health to continue to skyrocket.

The desire for colorblind practices often stems from the idea that discrimination simply won’t exist if we do not acknowledge our differences. In practice, however, colorblind approaches to medicine often yield poor outcomes for the relationship between medical professionals and their patients, and patient health outcomes in general. Trying to appear more unprejudiced by acting as if we don’t notice race, despite automatically seeing race, makes white practitioners appear more uncomfortable, anxious, and less friendly when working with patients of a different race than their own5.

Colorblind approaches to healthcare do not promote equity, genuine understanding, or cultural competency. Black women are almost four times more likely to die while giving birth than white women. Black infants are two to three times more likely to die within their first year of life than white newborns in the U.S.6 Not only that, but many of these deaths and other health complications that disproportionately affect Black and other women of color would be preventable if we were dedicating the proper attention needed to the unique needs of these groups. In other words, a colorblind approach that would be required by this budget language will literally cost us the lives and health of individuals are around the state.

Withholding potentially life-saving information, strategies, and approaches to medicine for the sake of avoiding the imaginary “horrors” of DEI is bad practice and unjust. We need the presence of positive forces like diversity, equity, and inclusion to give us the foundations for true relational equality. This budget language actively keeps us from accomplishing that goal.

In conclusion, we urge the committee to:

Allow the Medicaid doula coverage program to continue to operate without unnecessary and harmful limitations.

Remove the harmful and cruel language that limits what Medicaid mental health providers can discuss with their patients by defunding providers who “promote or affirm social gender transition.”

Continue to require the Department of Medicaid to apply for a federal waiver to expand continuous Medicaid coverage through age three.

Remove the language requiring the state to immediately terminate coverage for 770,000 Ohioans that rely on the Medicaid expansion for their health coverage.

Remove the language banning the Department of Medicaid from using Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in their work.

Thank you for your time and attention. I’m happy to answer any questions that the committee members might have.

The SAVE Act—one of the most explicit anti-democracy pieces of legislation we’ve seen yet—has reached Ohio. Both the state and federal versions of the bill will actively take away or severely limit people’s ability to participate in our democracy by infringing upon an essential right: voting! 

Here’s what you need to know, but if you’re just ready to take action, scroll down to the bottom to find a tool to easily email your Ohio state lawmakers. 

Both the state and federal bills require proof of U.S. citizenship for voting and define similar documents as acceptable proof of citizenship, including U.S. passports, birth certificates, naturalization certificates, and driver’s licenses that indicate citizenship status (most of which do not).  

If you don’t have one of these documents or have changed your name since one of these documents was issued, you will be unable to vote. 

• If you don’t have a passport or birth certificate that matches your current legal name, you will not be considered eligible to vote. If you have a birth certificate but you got married and changed your name, then your birth certificate no longer has your correct name on it. 
• Roughly 146 million Americans don’t have a valid passport. When you consider that 153 million Americans voted in the last election, it becomes very clear just how many people this requirement will effect, especially working-class and lower-income populations who are more likely to not have, and not be able to afford, a valid passport.  
• Beyond just not having a valid passport, 84% of women who get married change their surname. This means roughly 69 million American women do not have a birth certificate that matches their legal name, disqualifying their birth certificates from being considered valid documentation while trying to vote. Even more concerningly, marriage certificates are not stated to be a valid form of proof, leaving millions of people without a viable alternative.  

Should these pieces of legislation pass, it is likely that people will only be able to register to vote or update their registration at the BMV or county Board of Elections.  

With no voter registration drives, no voter registration forms at local events, and no online voter registration procedures, the voices of a significant portion of the population that currently relies on these services will be silenced in our elections.  

What does this mean in practice for Ohio?  

The Ohio SAVE Act will put a ban on all ballot drop boxes, requiring voters to hand-deliver ballots directly to election officials during office hours, potentially creating accessibility challenges for those with work, school, or childcare commitments. 

Ohio’s SAVE Act would require IDs to match voter information exactly. If not, you could be made to vote provisionally. “A provisional ballot is a ballot cast by a voter whose eligibility to vote cannot be proven at the polls on Election Day. If, after the election, administrators determine that the voter who cast the provisional ballot was eligible to vote, the ballot will be counted as a regular ballot.”  

You could be forced to vote provisionally if:  

• Your middle initial is listed on your voter registration but not on your license 
• You moved in the past 8 years but didn’t update your license 
• You use a nickname, for example your voter registration says Michael, but your license says Mike 
• You have ever changed your name for any reason at any time 
• BMV data is wrong or not updated  
• You don’t have a driver license or state ID  

If you vote provisionally and fail to provide proper documentation afterwards, your voter registration will be cancelled. Registrations could be cancelled before we even find out it’s too late to send in proper documentation! 

Who does this effect nationwide? 

• Anyone could be flagged at any time! 
• If you have a change in voter status of any kind, you will have to go in-person to update that information to be eligible to vote. Even small changes, like moving within a state you currently live in or a change in party affiliation, are considered a change in voter status. For every change, an in-person visit to an election office would be required regardless of how far you live from one of those locations.  
• Anyone who has ever used an online voter registration service, sent in a voter registration application through the mail, used an automatic voter registration (AVR) service, or registered through a voter registration drive would have to completely change how they register to vote going forward and may have their prior voter registrations wiped.  
• As said by The Center for American Progress, these changes “would make civic participation much more difficult for tens of millions of citizens every election cycle and would outright disenfranchise millions more. The policies of the SAVE Act would also be in addition to state voter ID laws that require voters to show identification at the polls.” 

If people’s ability to register to vote is impeded by unnecessary and discriminatory requirements, our democracy cannot call itself legitimate. Exercising our right to vote is one of the most fundamental rights we have. The SAVE Act directly takes that away from us.