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The crusade against a woman's right to choose continues in Kansas, where the state government is shelling out mad dough to keep abortion restrictions in place.

According to figures released by the attorney general's office upon request from the Associated Press, the state of Kansas has paid almost $1 million to two private law firms in an attempt to win court cases that challenge a variety of laws that directly impact not only women seeking abortions, but also those needing basic family planning services.

Cosmopolitan.com spoke with Peter Brownlie, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri, about these lawsuits to get a better picture of what's at stake here.

"These stringent and onerous regulations are intended to make it difficult, if not impossible, for women to get abortions," he says of the laws in question, which are being challenged by a variety of plaintiffs, including Planned Parenthood and a private physician practice. "[The Kansas] legislature continues to spend an unconscionable amount of time and money on laws that stand between women and their constitutional rights. Three out of the four abortion providers in the state of Kansas would go out of business [if these laws go into effect] because they will not be able to meet the licensing requirements and provisions in the new laws. Women in Kansas would have to travel great distances at great expense and hardship to obtain abortion care."

The regulations being challenged also impinge on free speech, Brownlie explains. Under a new mandate, abortion providers' websites must include an endorsement of, and a link to, Kansas' Woman's Right to Know website, which contains factually inaccurate information about abortion, including statements that the procedure raises a woman's cancer risk and that fetuses can feel pain at 20 weeks, both of which have been medically discredited.

Yet another law that Planned Parenthood is fighting includes a budget bill passed in 2011, which would make the organization ineligible for title 10 family planning funds. Essentially that means the state would cut off financial support to Planned Parenhood, cutting women off from access to non-abortion services such as routine Pap smears, STI testing, and breast exams. For low-income women, this regulation will have a huge impact, according to Brownlie—they may have to go without basic health care because other options could simply be too expensive for them.

"Women should be outraged that state dollars are being spent in these kind of ways when, for example, our education system isn't funded adequately," he says. "It's a travesty for the state to be spending a million dollars on laws the legislature knew would be challenged."

So essentially, if you're a woman in Kansas, you might want to think about moving.

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