U.S. SEES BATTLES IN STATE COURTS AND PRIMARIES; ISRAEL LOOSENS REGULATIONS

NEW ORLEANS: Abortion bans were temporarily blocked in Louisiana and Utah, while a federal court in South Carolina said a law sharply restricting the procedure would take effect there immediately as the battle over whether women may end pregnancies shifted from the nation’s highest court to courthouses around the country.

The US Supreme Court’s decision on Friday to end constitutional protection for abortion by overturning the precedent set by Roe v Wade opened the gates for a wave of litigation. One side sought quickly to put statewide bans into effect, and the other tried to stop or at least delay such measures.

Much of the initial court activity focused on “trigger laws,” adopted in 13 states that were designed to take effect swiftly upon last week’s ruling. Additional lawsuits could also target old anti-abortion laws that were left on the books in some states and went unenforced under Roe. Newer abortion restrictions that were put on hold pending the Supreme Court ruling are also coming back into play.

Rulings to put trigger laws on hold came swiftly in Utah and Louisiana on Monday, and a hearing was scheduled for Tuesday as Texas clinics seek assurances they can resume services for at least a few more weeks without risking prosecution.

A Utah judge on Monday blocked that state’s near-total abortion ban from going into effect for 14 days, to allow time for the court to hear challenges to the state’s trigger law.

Meanwhile, the midterm primary season enters a new, more volatile phase on Tuesday as voters participate in the first elections in Colorado and Illinois since the decision.

In Israel, the government on Monday eased its regulations on abortion access in what the country’s health minister Nitzan Horowitz, said was a response to last week’s “sad” US Supreme Court decision.

The new rules, approved by a parliamentary committee, grant women access to abortion pills through the country’s universal health system and remove a longstanding requirement that women appear physically before a special committee before they are permitted to terminate a pregnancy.