“The state of California gained’t be purchasing at Walgreens,” as Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis put it Thursday at a San Francisco fundraiser that raised $1.4 million for the nationwide abortion rights group NARAL Professional Alternative America.

Seeing California “be prepared to place their cash the place their values are is large,”  NARAL Professional Alternative America President Mini Timmaraju instructed me. 

That shift in technique is important in a post-Roe world the place abortion rights activists are preventing a multifront battle. They’re concurrently centered on creating laws that safeguards abortion rights, profitable elections and muscling via courtroom battles.

“We’re in disaster. We will not have a phased method,” Timmaraju stated. “You’ve acquired to do all of it.”

The following fast battle is a authorized one which activists count on to lose.

Any day now, activists imagine a conservative federal choose in Texas appointed by former President Donald Trump will concern a ruling that may ban the drug mifepristone, which is utilized in a majority of all U.S. abortions.

If U.S. District Choose Matthew Kacsmaryk agrees to ban the drug — which was authorised by the federal Meals and Drug Administration in 2000 — his ruling would apply nationwide, together with in California and two dozen different states the place abortion stays authorized. 

As a result of the ruling wouldn’t affect one other drug used for medicine abortions, Kacsmaryk’s choice wouldn’t ban all medicine abortions in California and different states that also allow the process. However abortions might develop into extra painful for the affected person, and the state’s reproductive care system might face extra challenges.

Walgreens blinked within the face of strain lately when it introduced that it could not distribute the medicine in 20 states the place conservative attorneys basic warned it to not mail abortion tablets or they might take authorized motion. That’s why Newsom stepped up this week. He wished to show up the warmth on companies that aren’t solely on the fallacious facet of historical past, they’re on the fallacious facet of the current. Nationally, 61% of People say abortion must be authorized in most or all instances, in keeping with Pew Analysis. In California, 67% of voters supported Proposition 1 in November, which enshrined abortion rights within the state’s structure. 

“California is not going to stand by as companies cave to extremists and lower off important entry to reproductive care and freedom,” Newsom stated. “California is on monitor to be the fourth largest economic system on the earth and we are going to leverage our market energy to defend the correct to decide on.”

Timmaraju desires to see extra of that sort of “aggressive stance.” 

“We actually want our company residents to grasp that at this second in time — with so many of us in danger, individuals dying from lack of entry to process — that we’d like them to face up for what’s authorized and proper,” she stated.

She applauded Newsom for stepping up “as a result of what we’re seeing is Republican officeholders prepared to bully companies. I do not notably advocate for Democratic lawmakers to bully companies, however they should have a powerful response.”

Timmaraju famous that regardless that the Republicans threatened Walgreens, they have not truly taken any authorized motion but. “And but, Walgreens instantly caved in locations the place they should not have,” she stated.

So some could shrug off calling out companies as a part of a “‘messaging conflict,’” Timmarjau stated, “it is an vital one, as a result of it does have an effect on how companies make choices.” She pointed to how greater than 700 firms nationally now belong to Don’t Ban Equality, an alliance whose mantra is that “public insurance policies that prohibit reproductive well being care are dangerous for enterprise” as a result of they affect “operations, advantages, tradition, workforce well being and security, and competitiveness for expertise.”

Public and political strain might additionally have an effect on the following step alongside the activists’ authorized path. If the Texas choose guidelines as anticipated, the following possible cease can be interesting the case to the fifth U.S. Circuit Court docket of Appeals. It has lengthy been a conservative courtroom, made much more conservative after Trump appointed a number of new judges throughout his time period. 

However whereas the appeals courtroom could also be “hostile” to reproductive rights, additionally it is “very professional enterprise,” stated Timmaraju, a local Texan. 

And that gives a gap for abortion rights activists. 

She desires companies to make the argument that the Texas case reveals that undermining the FDA “impacts the medical business and the functioning of public well being on this nation.”  

“We’d like the non-public sector to be aggressively concerned in submitting amicus briefs and speaking about how harmful this case may very well be,” Timmaraju stated. 

NARAL, nevertheless, has not known as for an all-out boycott in opposition to Walgreens as another left-leaning organizations have, together with Braveness California and East Space Democrats, a Los Angeles-based grassroots membership. Timmaraju stated that abortion rights advocacy organizations want to keep up a relationship with pharmaceutical firms, even when “it might not be a optimistic relationship. It may be a contentious relationship.” 

Walgreens and different pharma firms are nonetheless offering abortion medicine in states the place the process stays authorized, she stated, “and we’d like them to do this. So it’s kind of of a problem to enact a boycott, when in some instances, in some states, they’re doing life-saving work.”

She is pissed off, nevertheless, that the pharmaceutical business’s response to the potential medicine ban has largely been “pin drop silence.”

So now it might be time to show up the warmth on non-public sector firms that haven’t taken a powerful stand on abortion and different reproductive well being points.

Once more, she stated, California has a number one function to play. 

Final month, Newsom led governors from 21 states to type the Reproductive Freedom Alliance devoted to “defending and increasing reproductive freedom of their states.” It’s largely funded by two California-based establishments — the Rosenberg Basis and the California Wellness Basis.

After seeing what Newsom did to push again in opposition to Walgreens, Timmaraju desires the alliance to flex its collective muscle. 

“If one governor’s assertion can have an effect versus 20 some (Republican) attorneys basic,” she stated, “think about what 21 Democratic governors collectively — making their voices clear and heard to the American individuals and to the pharmaceutical business and firms like Walgreens — might do.”

California’s motion is already having an impact. On Thursday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and Lawyer Normal Tish James requested Walgreens and two different pharmacy chains to proceed promoting abortion medicine within the state.

They’d higher communicate up quickly, as a result of entry to abortion is about to shrink much more. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a probable GOP candidate for president, is backing a six-week abortion ban that’s supported by the state’s Republican-led legislature. 

If that restriction turns into regulation, a lot of the southeastern a part of the nation would develop into a digital abortion desert. That roster consists of two of the nation’s largest states: Florida and Texas. 

“Couple that with (abortion) medicine being taken off the cabinets,” Timmaraju stated. “and it’s going to be an ideal storm of pressured delivery.”

Attain Joe Garofoli: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com; Twitter: @joegarofoli