NEW NORMAL

13-Year-Old Rape Victim Forced to Give Birth Due to Mississippi’s Abortion Ban

It’s a story that experts believe will become more common after the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling last year.

A 13-year-old in Mississippi just became a mom after a stranger raped and impregnated her in 2022—and she hasn’t even started seventh grade yet. Thanks to Mississippi’s restrictive abortion laws, the middle schooler had no choice but to carry the traumatic pregnancy to term, according to a TIME profile on the unnamed girl. “She just said, ‘It hurts,’” the girl’s mother recalled after the assault. “She was crying in her room. I asked her what was wrong, and she said she didn’t want to tell me.” But when she found out her 13-year-old daughter was pregnant, a harsh reality set in. Mississippi is in the middle of a legal abortion desert—with surrounding states being incredibly restrictive, Chicago was the closest option. But the nine-hour drive trip proved too daunting for the girl and her mom. “I don’t have the funds for all this,” the mother said. So, her daughter delivered the baby in a birth that the 13-year-old only described as “painful.” It’s a story that experts believe will become more common after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization last year, which overturned Americans’ constitutional right to access abortion procedures.