Appeals court weighs immigrant teenager’s in-custody abortion case

• U. S. Federal judges weighing the case of a Central American teenager seeking to end her pregnancy seemed inclined on Friday to resolve the issue without wading into the explosive mix of immigration and abortion law — but at the same time acknowledged that such action may be impossible.

The judges recognized that finding a sponsor in the United States to take custody of the teen, who is being held in Texas after crossing the border illegally, may not be feasible in time for her to terminate her pregnancy. She is 15 weeks pregnant, and Texas bans most abortions after 20 weeks.

“Fairly quickly matters. We’re at a point where days matter,” Judge Patricia Millett said during the emergency hearing before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

The 17- year- old’s case reached the federal appeals court in Washington after a District Court judge on Wednesday ordered government officials to allow the teen to have an abortion “without delay.”

The Trump administration appealed, saying it is not obligated to facilitate an abortion in part because the U. S. government has an interest in “promoting child birth and fetal life.”

Lawyers for the government say they are not denying the teenager the right to abortion guaranteed by the 1973 Supreme Court ruling Roe v. Wade, because the girl could voluntarily leave the United States and try to seek an abortion elsewhere or find a sponsor to live with in this country.

The three- judge panel did not indicate when a ruling would be issued, but Kavanaugh concluded the hour- and- a- half long hearing by saying it would come “soon enough.”