The US town of Bristol, population around 44,000, is a divided community.
Split between Virginia and Tennessee, the state line runs literally down main street. While both sides have much in common, there is one major difference - abortion is illegal in Tennessee. This has been the case since the 2022 Supreme Court ruling which gave individual states, rather than the federal government, the power to legislate abortion, triggering 12 states to pass near-total bans.
So the city's only abortion clinic, Bristol Women's Health, moved less than a mile down the road to continue practicing legally in Virginia.
But just because abortion is legal in Virginia it doesn't mean the battle for abortion access is over.
It's like whack-a-mole, said Barbara Schwartz, the co-founder of SLAAP, the State Line Abortion Access Partnership. They assist people traveling into Virginia to get an abortion at Bristol Women's Health Clinic.
As soon as one approach doesn't work, the anti-abortion crowd pops up in Bristol and tries another.
On 22 December, Bristol's Circuit Court will hear the clinic's case against an eviction notice served by their landlords, brothers Chase and Chadwick King in April 2024. Lawyers for the clinic argue it has the right to renew its lease for a total of six more years. But if the judge rules in favor of the building's owners, the clinic will be forced to find a new home.
This is not the landlords' first attempt to remove the clinic from their property. The brothers claimed that the clinic fraudulently concealed that they perform abortions, to which they maintain to be adamantly opposed. The case was dismissed in September last year, with Judge Sage Johnson ruling:
If [the landlords] had conducted a simple internet search on their tenants, as any reasonably prudent landlord likely would, they would have discovered that the clinic did, in fact, provide abortion services as is plainly stated on their website.
Clinic owner Diana Derzis, who declined to comment on the hearing, previously stated that she hopes to keep the clinic in the city, even if they are evicted. However, she noted there are few other suitable facilities in Bristol, Virginia.
The clinic leaving Bristol would be a blow to abortion access, according to Barbara Schwartz. Since Roe v Wade was overturned, states where abortions are legal have become destinations for out-of-state abortion seekers, with 155,000 people crossing state lines last year, according to the Guttmacher Institute (GI).
The organization also found that over 9,200 people traveled to Virginia alone to have the procedure done last year. Bristol's position means the clinic is the closest place by several hours to get a safe and legal abortion for millions of southerners.
Victoria Cobb, the director of anti-abortion lobbyist the Family Foundation, also notes that Bristol's location places it at the epicenter of the debate. Ms Cobb launched efforts to restrict abortion by making use of local bylaws, aiming to prevent Bristol from turning into an abortion destination.
The Family Foundation has argued that the clinic goes against zoning regulation, which prohibits buildings from being used in a way that could endanger life. Their ordinance said no new clinics should be allowed to open in Bristol, and expansion of the existing clinic should be blocked.
The debate remains heated as Bristol councils seek to address the issue. It has been more stressful than dealing with a parking lot. It's not something that has really come to the local level before, Jay Detrick, the city's planning director, told the BBC.
Soon after the city decided not to intervene, Pastor Mark Lee Dickson spearheaded another effort to shut down the clinic, lobbying for the enforcement of the decades-old Comstock Act, which prohibits materials that could induce abortion.
As Bristol navigates these complex challenges, the town remains a critical front in the larger national debate over reproductive rights.
