A federal judge late Wednesday temporarily blocked enforcement of a Texas abortion law that effectively bans the procedure, delivering an early victory to the Biden administration in its legal challenge to the law.
In a 113-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman of Austin said the law is an “offensive deprivation of such an important right” and said state actors, including judges and court clerks, can no longer enforce its provisions.
“From the moment (the law) went into effect, women have been unlawfully prevented from exercising control over their lives in ways that are protected by the Constitution,” Pitman wrote.
Republican Gov. Greg Abbott signed the legislation, known as the “fetal heartbeat” bill, into law in May — forcing the issue of reproductive rights back into the political spotlight. The law bans abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually around six weeks of pregnancy and before many people realize they are pregnant. There are no exemptions in cases of rape or incest.
Pitman’s order blocks any officer of the state — including state court judges and court clerks — from enforcing the ban. He explicitly prohibits those officers from “accepting or docketing, maintaining, hearing, resolving, awarding damages in, enforcing judgments in, enforcing any administrative penalties in, and administering any lawsuit” brought under the state law. The judge also ordered the state to take proactive steps to inform court officials, as well as private individuals seeking to enforce the ban, that the law is currently blocked under his order.
Because government officials aren’t tasked with implementing the law, Texas argues that there is no one that a court can preemptively enjoin, the way the courts would preemptively enjoin officials from implementing the usual types of abortion restrictions that impose criminal or administrative punishments. At a court hearing in the case Friday, an attorney for the state said he could not identify a person that could be targeted by a court in an order blocking the law.
Pitman said in his order Wednesday that “despite the Texas Attorney General’s lack of clarity about what the State would do in the face of a preliminary injunction, this Court trusts that the State will identify the correct state officers, officials, judges, clerks, and employees to comply with this Order.”
Abortion providers say the legislation would restrict 85% of abortion procedures in Texas. The law is one of the most direct challenges on the boundaries of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion.
Similar six-week abortion laws in Georgia, Kentucky and other states have been blocked by federal courts.
But last month, the Supreme Court left the law to take effect. Over the objections of three liberal associate justices and Chief Justice John Roberts, the high court declined to block enforcement of the law in a 5-4 ruling.
Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor called the decision “stunning,” in a dissenting opinion joined by Associate Justices Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan.
Despite a federal court temporarily blocking enforcement Wednesday, the fight over the law — and abortion broadly — is far from over. Texas is likely to appeal the decision, and the legal fight could once again come before the U.S. Supreme Court depending on the ruling from an appeals court.
