Supporting Statement: United Parcel Services (“UPS”) is one of the largest logistics companies in the United States, delivering millions of packages each day to homes, pharmacies, and healthcare providers. As a critical link in the national supply chain, UPS plays a central role in the transportation of regulated, controlled, and high-risk items. In January 2023, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that retail and mail-order pharmacies may dispense mifepristone, an abortion drug. That decision expanded access to abortion-inducing drugs through mail-based delivery systems, including private carriers like UPS. But the legal and political environment surrounding this drug is unsettled and increasingly contentious. The Comstock Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1462, makes it a felony to use a common carrier to transport any “substance, drug, medicine, or thing ... calculated to lead another to use or apply it for producing abortion.” This outlaws shipping mifepristone from and to anyone and could apply anywhere in the supply chain. It also extends to drugs like misoprostol, which is often used in conjunction with mifepristone. Further, more than 20 states have enacted laws restricting or prohibiting abortioninducing drugs. Some states also have regulations directly prohibiting the prescription and distribution of abortion drugs through the mail.1 How these laws interact with evolving FDA guidance on mifepristone and DOJ guidance on the Comstock Act is unclear. Many state attorneys general wrote twice to major pharmacies and mail-order and telehealth distributors on this in 2023 to advise them of these legal risks.2 Others have expressed concern that state attorneys general may also be able to enforce Comstock Act violations directly through state anti-racketeering laws.3 Recently, the State of Louisiana even sued the FDA because telehealth pharmacies from other states are dispensing thousands of mifepristone pills to Louisiana residents. 4 The lawsuit challenges the FDA’s rulemaking allowing mifepristone to be dispensed without an in-person consultation, argues that it is inconsistent with the Comstock Act, and acknowledges that whether the FDA’s scheme can preempt Louisiana’s laws prohibiting abortion is unclear. 1 https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/press/Letter_3.pdf 2 https://www.axios.com/2023/02/01/attorney-general-letter-cvs-walgreens-abortion; https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/news/releases/paxton-sends-letter-company-highlighting-illegalitiesdistributing-abortion-pills-through-mail 3 https://statecourtreport.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/anti-abortion-strategies-center-19th-century-federallaw?utm_source=chatgpt.com 4 https://www.klfy.com/louisiana/louisiana-suing-federal-government-over-abortion-drugs-by-mail/ If UPS continues to help telehealth clinics and others to distribute mifepristone and misoprostol intended to be used for abortions, it exposes itself to significant legal, regulatory, and political risk. It also generates significant reputational risk. In August 2025, for example, Costco announced that it would not dispense mifepristone at its over 500 pharmacy locations5 after 17 state financial officers6 and investors with over $100 billion in assets under management7 advised Costco to ignore countervailing pressure from the New York City Comptroller. This move signals the intense reputational stakes for companies in the pharmaceutical distribution chain.