The Texas Supreme Court dealt the final blow to abortion clinics’ hopes of stopping the sweeping, restrictive state law banning almost all abortions.
The extremely controversial law bans abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy — which is before the majority of people know they are pregnant — and leaves no exceptions even for rape or incest. The law has sharply curtailed the number of abortions in Texas since it was implemented in September, and now it looks like the law will stay in place for the foreseeable future.
The all-Republican Texas Supreme Court handed down the ruling, slamming the door on the narrow path towards the U.S. Supreme Court to block the new law.
The Texan abortion ban is considered one of the biggest attacks against the constitutional right to abortion, which has prevailed for five decades but is under fire across the U.S.
The Texas law puts enforcement into the hands of civilians, effectively making people bounty hunters. Whopping rewards of $10,000 are offered for successful lawsuits against anyone, from drivers to pharmacists to doctors, who “aids or abets” someone trying to get an abortion after six weeks.
It is now the most restrictive abortion law in the country.
The state ban flies in the face of the Supreme Court’s 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade ruling, which prohibits states from banning abortions before a fetus is viable outside of the womb, currently at about 23 weeks of pregnancy.
By enabling civilians to become bounty hunters against abortions and expressly banning the enforcement of the law by state officials, the law was designed to escape judicial review in federal court. It seems that may have worked. The Supreme Court was asked to block the law before it came into effect in September 2021, but the high court refused to step in.
However, the court left open the smallest of all windows, saying that opponents of the restrictive law could file suit against Texas medical licensing officials, who then might discipline abortion providers violating the law. The Texas Supreme Court weighed in on Friday, saying these officials do not have any power to enforce the law, and therefore cannot be sued.
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