Sarah McCammon

A new Gallup poll finds a record number of Americans are unhappy with the nation's abortion laws — a shift mostly caused by growing dissatisfaction among Democrats.

"This is almost entirely driven my Democrats and Independents who lean Democratic," said Lydia Saad, Gallup's director of U.S Social Research. "So that underlying trend is very clear, and it's showing up in the attitudes among all Americans."

The U.S. Supreme Court says it will consider whether employers should be allowed to opt out of providing contraceptive coverage to their workers because of moral or religious objections.

Fearing potential violence, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam is declaring a state of emergency and is banning firearms and other weapons on the Capitol grounds in Richmond ahead of a gun rights demonstration planned for next week.

"We have received credible intelligence from our law enforcement agencies that there are groups with malicious plans for the rally that is planned for Monday," Northam said during a press conference Wednesday afternoon.

Updated at 7:59 p.m. ET

Andrea Miller first heard about the Equal Rights Amendment from her mother.

"It basically went, 'I'm very interested in the Equal Rights Amendment; I disagree with it a little — I think women are superior to men — but we'll settle for being equal,' " Miller said with a laugh. "That was basically what my mother told me."

On a recent Saturday morning at Hope Medical Group for Women in Shreveport, La., Kathaleen Pittman was preparing for a day of procedures, as a couple dozen patients sat quietly in the waiting area.

A group of female pilots and flight attendants is accusing Frontier Airlines of discriminating against pregnant and nursing women, forcing them to take extended and largely unpaid leave while pregnant, and refusing to accommodate breastfeeding.

With Missouri potentially on the verge of becoming the only state without a clinic that performs abortions, Democrats in Congress are holding a hearing Thursday to look into the regulation of clinics by state officials.

On a recent, cloudy fall afternoon, Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin stood outside the governor's mansion in Frankfort, flanked by a couple dozen activists in blue T-shirts, holding signs that read, "I Vote Pro-Life."

"It took me a while to figure out why I keep seeing these blue T-shirts," Bevin joked as he turned to the volunteers. "I wasn't sure who you were, but I'm just grateful to you."

These activists have been door-knocking across Kentucky on Bevin's behalf, to reach 200,000 voters before the election on Nov. 5.

With abortion-rights activists playing defense from statehouses to the Supreme Court, Planned Parenthood is unveiling a new campaign push focused on the 2020 elections.

The organization is announcing its largest electoral effort yet — with plans to spend at least $45 million backing candidates in local, state and national races who support abortion rights.

President Trump has won at least a temporary reprieve from a judge's order to release his tax records as part of a criminal investigation into his business dealings. Those records could be released to investigators as litigation continues.

Tax experts say the documents could reveal a lot — or not much at all — about Trump's financial history.

It has been a week since the disturbing discovery of thousands of fetal remains at the home of a former abortion provider, and authorities still don't know why he kept them.

Ulrich Klopfer had performed abortions at three clinics in Indiana but lived across the state line in Illinois.

When Arlen found out she was pregnant this year, she was still finishing college and knew she didn't want a child.

There's a clinic near her home, but Arlen faced other obstacles to getting an abortion.

"I started researching about prices, and I was like, 'Well, I don't have $500,' " said Arlen, who is in her 20s and lives in El Paso, Texas. We're not using her full name to protect her privacy.

"So I was like, 'OK, there's gotta be other ways.' "

Her research led her to information about self-induced abortion using pills.

Updated at 5 p.m. ET

A European doctor who prescribes abortion pills to American women over the Internet is suing the Food and Drug Administration in an effort to continue providing the medications to patients in the United States.

The lawsuit being filed Monday in federal court in Idaho names several federal officials, including U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.

Updated at 5:37 p.m. ET

Planned Parenthood is leaving the federal Title X family planning program rather than comply with new Trump administration rules regarding abortion counseling.

The new rules, issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services earlier this year, prohibit Title X grantees from providing or referring patients for abortion, except in cases of rape, incest or medical emergency.

Updated at 5:41 p.m. ET

Planned Parenthood says it will formally withdraw from the nation's family planning program for low-income people within days, unless a federal court intervenes.

This is a story about two small-town Virginia churches with the same name, but two very different congregations. They've each found themselves caught up in controversy tied to President Trump's racist rhetoric. NPR's Sarah McCammon recently visited both congregations.

Joshua Harris, one of the most influential voices on sex and relationships for a generation of evangelical Christians, announced this past week that he and his wife are separating after 20 years of marriage.

Harris' book, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, was published in 1997 when he was in his early 20s. It became a manual for young evangelicals looking for love.

In recent years, Harris has apologized for some of the ideas he promoted and publicly wrestled with them in a documentary.

Updated at 5:10 p.m. ET

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders is leaving the White House, President Trump tweeted on Thursday.

Updated at 12:32 p.m. ET

In the aftermath of a mass shooting that killed 12 people in Virginia Beach, Va., Gov. Ralph Northam is calling a special legislative session to address gun violence.

"We must do more than give our thoughts and prayers; we must give Virginians the action they deserve," Northam said during a news conference Tuesday morning in Richmond, Va.

With hours to go before the expiration of a state license that allows a Planned Parenthood health center in Missouri to perform abortions, clinics in neighboring states say they're preparing for an influx of additional patients.

Updated at 2:50 p.m. ET

Opponents of abortion rights have a long history of supporting abortion bans with three major exceptions: when the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, or when a woman's life is at risk.

But fueled by momentum from the passage of a restrictive abortion law in Alabama, a coalition of anti-abortion-rights groups released a letter Wednesday asking Republican officials to "reconsider decades-old talking points" on exceptions to such laws.