September 29, 2026:

When several New York midwives were arrested in 2020, it spurred these rural religious communities into political activism—and inspired a PBS film. Rewire News Group interviewed a midwife who was criminally charged in the crackdown.

Arrest the Midwife, a PBS documentary released on Aug. 30, explores the essential—and occasionally criminalized—role of midwives in Amish and Mennonite communities, two Christian groups collectively referred to as the “Plain People.”

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Melissa Carman, a certified professional midwife, or CPM, was arrested in New York state on charges of hindering prosecution and unauthorized practice of a profession for operating an “illegal midwifery practice.” Arrest the Midwife traces how the state’s criminal justice system punished her and other midwives, and prevented them from attending births. 

Carman began practicing midwifery in 2013 and now runs a Pennsylvania birthing center near the New York border popular among Plain families. Amish and Mennonite women generally prefer to give birth in a birth center or at home, rather than in hospitals. 

In most U.S. states, two kinds of midwives could attend their births: certified nurse-midwives, who’ve earned degrees in both nursing and midwifery and can work in hospitals; and CPMs, whose training enables them to care for mothers birthing out of the hospital. 

But in New York, CPMs are not allowed to obtain a midwifery license, and so cannot attend any births—even home births. Nurse-midwives may attend births at home or in a hospital, and since 2010 have even been empowered to run their own birthing centers. Yet in many rural areas of the state, there simply aren’t enough nurse-midwives to meet demand. 

In 2020, a newborn baby boy died in upstate New York shortly after his laboring mother, an Amish woman, was transferred to the hospital. Authorities arrested the CPM who’d overseen his mother’s care, Elizabeth Catlin. She was charged with unlawfully practicing the profession of midwifery, among dozens of other charges. 

This ordeal took place during the COVID pandemic, when the state had permitted CPMs licensed in other states to attend births in New York. Even so, two more local CPMs were arrested, including Carman. 

Arrest the Midwife documents how the arrests activated Amish and Mennonite women. They launched letter-writing campaigns and advocated for state legislation that would allow CPMs to practice legally in New York (the bill was introduced in 2025). These were striking acts of political engagement for communities that historically have held themselves apart from secular, public life.

Rewire News Group interviewed Carman about the potential legal risks of her profession, culturally appropriate birth care, and what midwives mean to a community.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

How did you begin caring for moms in the Plain community? Are you from a Plain community? 

No, I’m not. I know it sounds…kind of hokey, but I was called to do this work. I felt like they did not have the resources available to them. I did like the fact that they used a lot of complementary alternative methods, with tinctures and homeopathy, and just kind of finding natural ways to deal with problems instead of always medicine, medicine, medicine.

Why are CPMs the preferred form of labor and delivery care in Plain communities?

Most of these folks, when they’re dealing with something, they really want a natural way to deal with it. They’re willing to use medicine if it’s necessary. That’s always the big word they like to use: ‘Well, is it Melissa? Is it necessary?’ They’ll use it if they have to, if nothing else is working.

Is that why they prefer birthing out of the hospital? 

Yes, they want to feel cared for. They want to feel that they’re not another number walking through [the door]. 

And keep in mind, I absolutely think we have to have hospitals. We have to have OBs. We have to have trained surgeons. We absolutely have women who are high risk that are not appropriate for out-of-hospital care. 

I have a client right now who’s pregnant with twins. Her first baby was born at 33 weeks. [With] her second baby, she had preeclampsia, and we had to use some herbs to get her labor going. That was at 37 weeks. So now she’s pregnant with twins, and she’s already showing some signs of preterm labor. 

[Because of these risks], I’m making referrals so that she can be seen by a higher-level provider. I know that she’s not appropriate for out-of-hospital care.

In the film, you say that some people are driving three hours to your birth center. Why is that, and how do such long trips shape your practice, given that people might have an emergency—or a baby—on the way?

Just in my time in midwifery, I’ve seen at least ten hospitals close their doors for maternity care. I talk about it in the film, like, where are people supposed to go? There’s an eight-county region just here in Pennsylvania that has no maternity care at all.

This is not benefiting women. They can’t get OB-GYN care or certain surgeries, female surgeries.

[I just saw one pregnant patient, an Amish woman,] who went to [the hospital with a] blood clot in her left thigh. She showed it to me. It was red, inflamed, warm to the touch. The [doctors there] didn’t give her anything. They recommended [that she] take care and use warm compresses. … [This] hospital closed their maternity [unit] years ago. I was surprised they didn’t put her on…a blood thinner, but they didn’t. 

We’ve had many car births. And then I tell them, Keep on rolling, keep on rolling. Get over the border. If a woman chooses to have me attend her birth, [it] is a felony in the State of New York.

Back in 2020, you were arrested and ultimately placed on probation. You’re in Pennsylvania now, where CPMs can legally practice. But how has that experience shaped your work?

Obviously, I [am] scared to death that if someone happens to deliver quickly on the way here in the state of New York: How does that look for me? I’ve told people, If I get caught doing anything in New York I’ll go right to jail. 

Over the past several years, not only have we seen Roe struck down, we’ve also seen a more-intense criminalization of pregnancy in general. How has the changing culture around abortion and pregnancy shaped your practice? 

We don’t do abortions here. However, there’s been a couple of situations where the families have no choice [but to terminate a pregnancy]. 

One [Amish] lady had HELLP syndrome [a rare, dangerous pregnancy complication]. Her baby had a heartbeat, but it was completely unable to survive outside of the uterus [because of a fetal abnormality]. 

They called it a stillbirth. But the truth of it was that they had to induce her labor [as abortion care], because it was killing her. If the pregnancy had continued, she would have died. In another state, what would have happened because of the Dobbs decision? New York [where she lives] still does have the ability to help women.

We also have women who have incomplete miscarriages. In some states they’re criminalized for that. I haven’t seen that happen to the Amish, I think because [authorities] don’t think Amish [people] would do abortions. But [for] non-Plain people…I don’t think they would be given that much grace.      

In the film, you note that just as women will seek abortion even if it’s not legal, they’ll birth at home even if no one is around to care for them. Can you talk about the stakes, to these mothers, where the licensure isn’t even on the table like in New York right now? What do CPMs mean for the community? 

We have this measles outbreak [in Pennsylvania]. My clinic here—we [notified] the Department of Health. We put in protocols and signs outside and screening methods. We gave packets to people. We got in touch with the hospital…

We have hundreds of people who got vaccinated. Unfortunately, it still did spread quite a bit…many people have it. 

If [pregnant people] get sick, they have a higher chance for stillbirth, higher chance for preterm labor. One lady [with measles] from Steuben County [in New York] is choosing to have an unattended home birth because of the risk of [infecting other patients]. She goes, “Well, we have a book.”     

It’s very hard. This is part of the whole informed choice model of care and autonomy of the human body. If a woman chooses something, we have to honor and respect that. And that we’ve done our job to give them all the risks, the benefits, and the alternatives. But that’s not always an easy pill for us as providers to swallow.

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