A Year of Change for a North Dakota Abortion Clinic, and the Composer John Williams

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

News, David, Books, Arts, Storytelling, Wnyc, New, Remnick, News Commentary, Yorker, Politics

4.2 • 5.5K Ratings

🗓️ 23 June 2023

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A year ago, the staff writer Emily Witt visited Fargo, North Dakota, to report on the Red River Women’s Clinic—the only abortion provider in the state. The Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision had just come down, and the clinic was scrambling to move across state lines, to the adjacent city of Moorhead, Minnesota. This spring, Witt returned to talk with Tammi Kromenaker, the clinic’s director. Kromenaker says the clinic’s new home has had some notable upsides—a parking lot that shields patients from protestors, for example—but North Dakota patients are increasingly fearful as they reach out for care, afraid even to cross the state line for an abortion. Plus, The New Yorker’s Alex Ross discusses John Williams, who has written scores for generations of blockbusters, including “Jaws,” “Star Wars,” “Harry Potter,” and many films of Steven Spielberg. Ross considers him the last practitioner of Hollywood’s grand orchestral tradition, and his retirement will mark the end of an era in music: at ninety-one years old, Williams has said that his score for “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” may be his last.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNWC Studios and The New Yorker.
0:11.3	Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour, I'm David Remnick.
0:14.6	One year ago, staff writer Emily Whit visited Fargo North Dakota.
0:19.4	She was there to report on the Red River Women's Clinic, the only abortion provider in the
0:24.2	state.
0:25.2	The Supreme Court's DOBS decision had just come down and the Red River Clinic was in deep
0:30.2	peril.
0:31.2	Since then, 14 states in the country, 14, including North Dakota, have now largely banned abortion.
0:39.1	Let's just pull over for a second.
0:42.7	So about a year later, Emily Whit went back to Fargo and the site of the Red River Clinic.
0:47.9	Yeah, there used to be security cramers.
0:51.1	The kids are still there and the kind of glass bricks to keep things private, but there's
0:57.4	really no sign except for the sign that's still up against the wall there that this used
1:03.2	to be a clinic for, I think, almost 25 years.
1:08.2	All right, turning on the car.
1:15.1	She headed east, passed an anti-abortion billboard, passed some parking lots and auto shop
1:20.7	driving toward the river.
1:22.5	The Red River, which is the border between Minnesota and North Dakota, is really just a couple
1:29.5	of blocks from the whole clinic.
1:31.3	And we're driving over it right now on the first Avenue bridge, we're passing by a recreated
1:41.9	biking ship museum.
1:45.0	The Red River isn't wide here, but it now forms a border, a distinct border between
	...

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