Houston Chronicle Sunday

Texas clinics cancel abortions

Providers again look to Supreme Court

- By Paul J. Weber

AUSTIN — Texas clinics on Saturday canceled appointmen­ts they had booked during a 48-hour reprieve from the most restrictiv­e abortion law in the U.S., which was back in effect as weary providers again turn their sights to the Supreme Court.

The Biden administra­tion, which sued Texas over the law known as Senate Bill 8, has yet to say whether it will go that route after a federal appeals court reinstated the law late Friday. The latest twist came two days after a lower court in Austin suspended the law, which bans abortions once cardiac activity is detected, usually around six weeks, before some women know they are pregnant. It makes no exceptions in cases of rape or incest.

The White House had no immediate comment Saturday.

“We are once again forced to turn away more patients who need us, creating chaos and confusion in our health center,” Melaney Linton, president & CEO of Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast said in a statement. “The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has failed Texans by allowing the state to continue depriving its citizens of

constituti­onally protected health care and lifting the preliminar­y injunction that had blocked this cruel law for just two days.”

Planned Parenthood provided abortions to seven patients during the reprieve, but had to cancel more than half of the 23 procedures scheduled for Saturday.

“Like hundreds before them, they tragically lost access to abortion in Texas overnight,” she said. “These are real people with real lives, and their ability to access abortion in their own state should not change day by day, hour by hour.”

For now at least, the law is in the hands of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which allowed the restrictio­ns to resume pending further arguments. In the meantime, Texas abortions providers and patients are right back to where they’ve been for most of the last six weeks.

Out-of-state clinics already inundated with Texas patients seeking abortions were again the closest option for many women. Providers say others are being forced to carry pregnancie­s to term, or waiting in hopes that courts will strike down the law that took effect on Sept. 1.

There are also new questions — including whether anti-abortion advocates will try punishing Texas physicians who performed abortions during the brief window the law was paused from late Wednesday to late Friday. Texas leaves enforcemen­t solely in the hands of private citizens who can collect $10,000 or more in damages if they successful­ly sue abortion providers who flout the restrictio­ns.

Texas Right to Life, the state’s largest anti-abortion group, created a tip line to receive reports of violators. About a dozen calls came in after U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman suspended the law, said John Seago, the group’s legislativ­e director.

Although some Texas clinics said they had briefly resumed abortions on patients who were beyond six weeks, Seago said his group had no lawsuits in the works. He said the clinics’ public statements did not “match up with what we saw on the ground,” which he says include a network of observers and crisis pregnancy centers.

“I don’t have any credible evidence at the moment of litigation that we would bring forward,” Seago said Saturday.

Texas had roughly two dozen abortion clinics before the law took effect. At least six clinics resumed performing abortions after six weeks of pregnancy during the reprieve, according to the Center for Reproducti­ve Rights.

At Whole Woman’s Health, which has four abortion clinics in Texas, president and CEO Amy Hagstrom Miller said she did not have the number of abortions her locations performed for patients beyond six weeks but put it at “quite a few.” She said her clinics were again complying with the law and acknowledg­ed the risks her physicians and

staff had taken.

“Of course we are all worried,” she said. “But we also feel a deep commitment to providing abortion care when it is legal to do, so we did.”

Pitman, the federal judge who halted the Texas law Wednesday in a blistering 113-page opinion, was appointed by President Barack Obama. He called the law an “offensive deprivatio­n” of the constituti­onal right to an abortion, but his ruling was swiftly set aside — at least for now — in a onepage order by the 5th Circuit on Friday night.

That same appeals court previously allowed the Texas restrictio­ns to take effect in September, in a separate lawsuit brought by abortion providers. This time, the court gave the Justice Department until 5 p.m. Tuesday to respond.

What happens after that is unclear, including how soon the appeals court will act on whether they will request more arguments. Texas is asking the appeals court for a permanent injunction that would allow the law to stand while the case plays out.

In the meantime, Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproducti­ve Rights, urged the Supreme Court to “step in and stop this madness.” Last month, the high court allowed the law to move forward in a 5-4 decision, although it did so without ruling on the law’s constituti­onality.

The Biden administra­tion could bring the case back to the Supreme Court and ask it to quickly restore Pitman’s order, although it is unclear whether they will do so.

 ?? Melissa Phillip / Staff photograph­er ?? People taking part in the Houston Women’s March against the Texas abortion ban walk from Discovery Green to City Hall on Oct. 2.
Melissa Phillip / Staff photograph­er People taking part in the Houston Women’s March against the Texas abortion ban walk from Discovery Green to City Hall on Oct. 2.

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