MOST ABORTIONS IN TEXAS END AS STRICT LAW STANDS
Emergency appeal rejected Wednesday
In 5-4 vote, a deeply divided Supreme Court allows the nation’s most rigid roadblock to procedure to remain in force for now.
A deeply divided Supreme Court is allowing a Texas law that bans most abortions to remain in force, stripping most women of the right to an abortion in the nation’s second-largest state.
The court voted 5-4 late Wednesday to deny an emergency appeal from abortion providers and others that sought to block enforcement of the law that went into effect Wednesday.
The Texas law, signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in May, prohibits abortions once medical professionals can detect cardiac activity, usually around six weeks and before most women know they’re pregnant.
“In reaching this conclusion, we stress that we do not purport to resolve definitively any jurisdictional or substantive claim in the applicants’ lawsuit. In particular, this order is not based on any conclusion about the constitutionality of Texas’s law, and in no way limits other procedurally proper challenges to the Texas law, including in Texas state courts,” the court said in the unsigned order.
Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Stephen Breyer, Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Justice Elena Kagan dissented.
It is the strictest law against abortion rights in the United States since the high court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 and part of a broader push by Republicans across the country to impose new restrictions on abortion. At least 12 other states have enacted bans early in pregnancy, but all have been blocked from going into effect.
What makes the Texas law different is its unusual enforcement scheme. Rather than have officials responsible for enforcing the law, private citizens are authorized to sue abortion providers and anyone involved in facilitating abortions. Among other situations, that would include anyone who drives a woman to a clinic to get an abortion. Under the law, anyone who successfully sues another person would be entitled to at least $10,000.
“Starting today, every unborn child with a heartbeat will be protected from the ravages of abortion,” Abbott said in a statement posted on Twitter. “Texas will always defend the right to life.” But protests were quick. President Joe Biden said in a statement that the law “blatantly violates the constitutional right established under Roe v. Wade and upheld as precedent for nearly half a century.” He said the law “outrageously” gives private citizens the power “to bring lawsuits against anyone who they believe has helped another person get an abortion.”
Likewise, the American Medical Association said it was deeply disturbed by “this egregious law.” The law “not only bans virtually all abortions in the state, but it interferes in the patient-physician relationship, and places bounties on physicians and health care workers simply for delivering care,” said a statement from Dr. Gerald E. Harmon, the AMA president.
Clinics have said the law would rule out 85% of abortions in Texas and force many clinics to close. Planned Parenthood is among the abortion providers that have stopped scheduling abortions beyond six weeks from conception.
Abortion rights advocates say it will force many women to travel out of state for abortions, if they can afford to do so, and also navigate issues including childcare and taking time off work. The Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that supports abortion rights, says if legal abortion care in Texas shuts down, the average one-way driving distance to an abortion clinic for Texans would increase from 12 miles to 248 miles.