Biden administration asks Supreme Court to pause Texas abortion law
The Biden administration is asking the Supreme Court to block the Texas law banning most abortions, while the fight over the measure's constitutionality plays out in the courts.
The law has been in effect since September, aside from a district court-ordered pause that lasted just 48 hours, and bans abortions once cardiac activity is detected, usually around six weeks and before some women know they are pregnant.
Video above: Texas women flee to nearby states for abortions
The Justice Department asked the high court Monday to lift an order imposed by a conservative federal appeals court that has allowed Texas to continue enforcing the nation's strictest curbs on abortion through a novel law that was written to make it hard to challenge in the federal court system. The department had announced its intentions last Friday.
The Texas law defies the Supreme Court's major decisions on abortion rights 바카라 게임 웹사이트by banning abortion long before viability 바카라 게임 웹사이트 indeed, before many women even realize they are pregnant,바카라 게임 웹사이트 the Justice Department wrote in its plea to the court.
바카라 게임 웹사이트The question now is whether Texas바카라 게임 웹사이트 nullification of this Court바카라 게임 웹사이트s precedents should be allowed to continue while the courts consider the United States바카라 게임 웹사이트 suit. As the district court recognized, it should not,바카라 게임 웹사이트 the Justice Department wrote.
It's not clear whether the administration will prevail at a Supreme Court with a conservative majority that has been fortified by three appointees of former President Donald Trump and already has agreed to hear a major challenge to abortion rights in a case from Mississippi.
The Trump appointees, joined by two other conservatives, have once before rejected a plea to keep the law on hold, in a separate lawsuit filed by abortion providers. There was no immediate timetable for Supreme Court action on this latest motion.
While courts have blocked other state laws effectively banning abortion before a fetus can survive outside the womb, roughly around 24 weeks, the Texas law has so far avoided a similar fate because of its unique structure that leaves enforcement up to private citizens, rather than state officials. Anyone who brings a successful lawsuit against an abortion provider for violating the law is entitled to claim at least $10,000 in damages.
In the 5-4 vote last month to allow the law to remain in effect, the high court acknowledged in an unsigned order that there were 바카라 게임 웹사이트serious questions regarding the constitutionality of the Texas law바카라 게임 웹사이트 but also 바카라 게임 웹사이트complex and novel바카라 게임 웹사이트 procedural questions about whom to sue and whether federal courts had the power to stop the law from being enforced.
In a dissenting opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that he would have put the 바카라 게임 웹사이트unprecedented바카라 게임 웹사이트 law on hold so that the court could consider 바카라 게임 웹사이트whether a state can avoid responsibility for its laws바카라 게임 웹사이트 by handing off enforcement. The court바카라 게임 웹사이트s three liberal justices also dissented.
The question now is whether the administration바카라 게임 웹사이트s presence in the new lawsuit will make a difference. A three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals provided its answer late Thursday, extending its earlier order that allows the law to remain in effect. In a 2-1 vote, the court said it was siding with Texas for the same reasons the Supreme Court and a different 5th Circuit panel cited in the providers바카라 게임 웹사이트 lawsuit 바카라 게임 웹사이트 questioning whether anyone could march into federal court to challenge the law.
Texas sought help from the appeals court after U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman ruled that the Justice Department did have the ability to sue and that he had the authority to stop the law from being enforced, writing that 바카라 게임 웹사이트women have been unlawfully prevented from exercising control over their lives in ways that are protected by the Constitution.바카라 게임 웹사이트
The judge conceded, however, that 바카라 게임 웹사이트other courts may find a way to avoid this conclusion.바카라 게임 웹사이트