January 22, 2025
Shining a Light on Justice: Latina Futures’ Work on Forced Sterilization and Reproductive Rights
By Paula Valle
The fight for reproductive justice is not just about securing rights – it’s about addressing historical injustices and ensuring they are never repeated. Latina Futures 2050 Lab’s (Latina Futures) commitment to amplifying the voices and experiences of Latinas is essential in advancing equitable healthcare and systemic barriers. By shedding light on the forced sterilization of Latinas, a dark chapter in American history, and advocating for justice, Latina Futures is transforming this conversation into a platform for meaningful change.
Forced sterilization has disproportionately targeted women of color, particularly Latinas, as part of a broader legacy of systemic racism and human rights abuses. Between 1960 and 1979, Los Angeles General Medical Center (formerly Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center) became infamous for its involvement in sterilizing women without their full consent. Many of these women were Spanish-speaking immigrants coerced into signing documents during labor or pressured while seeking pain relief. This practice robbed them of their reproductive autonomy and caused irreversible harm to their lives and families.
To confront this painful history, Latina Futures collaborated with the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center (CSRC) to digitize and catalog archival collections related to forced sterilization. These include the Virginia Espino and Renee Tajima-Peña Collection of Sterilization Records and the Vélez-Ibáñez Sterilization Research Collection. These invaluable materials, which include court transcripts from the landmark Madrigal v. Quilligan case, research notes, and media clippings, are critical resources for understanding the systemic injustices tied to forced sterilization.
The Madrigal v. Quilligan case, brought by a group of Latina women against Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center, exposed how systemic racism and implicit bias led to the violation of their bodily autonomy. Though the women did not win the case, it laid bare the urgent need for accountability and justice. The case also serves as a stark reminder of how reproductive rights and the right to decide when and how to have a family intersect with broader conversations about civil rights and equity.
The recent overturning of Roe v. Wade has reignited national debates about reproductive rights, making the lessons from Madrigal v. Quilligan more relevant than ever. Forced sterilization is not a relic of the past. Reports from as recently as the 2000s highlight instances of forced sterilization in California prisons, and in 2020, immigrant women in Georgia’s ICE detention centers reported being sterilized without consent. These parallels underscore the need for vigilance in protecting bodily autonomy and advancing inclusive policies.
Latina Futures has worked tirelessly to ensure these histories inform contemporary advocacy and policy. In 2021, Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo led the creation of the California Forced or Involuntary Sterilized Compensation Program, which allocated $7.5 million to assist survivors sterilized in state-run institutions. However, survivors of forced sterilization at Los Angeles General Medical Center were initially excluded due to its status as a county-run facility. Recognizing this gap, Assemblywoman Carrillo secured additional funding for a community-based study led by the Alliance for a Better Community (ABC) to document and acknowledge these survivors’ experiences.
The findings of ABC’s study were presented at a November 2024 roundtable convened by the Select Committee on Latina Inequities. The event brought together legislative leaders, advocates, and scholars to discuss the systemic racism and human rights violations tied to forced sterilization and explore pathways for justice. Key participants included CSRC Head Librarian Xaviera Flores and Latina Futures Librarian Krystell Jimenez, who emphasized the importance of preserving these stories through archival work. The roundtable highlighted how this history informs broader discussions on reproductive rights, particularly in the context of the Dobbs decision.
