U.S. Supreme Court Votes to Allow Texas Six-Week Abortion Ban

A detrimental blow to body autonomy and a violation of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court precedent, the U.S. Supreme Court has allowed a ban affecting most abortions to go into effect in Texas and since refused to block the new law.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) signed S.B. 8 in May, allowing anyone in the state to sue for a $10,000 bounty if they believe someone has carried out an abortion following the sixth week of pregnancy, or even if they helped to procure an abortion, i.e. an Uber driver who gives a patient a ride to a clinic.

The Supreme Court refused to act on an emergency request that would delay the law while it is challenged in the court, and Wednesday, the Supreme Court justices ruled 5-4 against granting an injunction that would prevent the law’s enforcement. All three of Trump’s Supreme Court appointees voted against blocking the ban.

The court’s majority said the decision wasn’t based in whether Texas’s new law was constitutional or not and said there is still open opportunity for legal challenges moving forward. They say the technical question of who can be sued means they can’t issue an injunction, even though it clearly violates the Supreme Court precedent.

The bill also has no exceptions for rape or incest, only narrowly drawn allowances for health reasons: if it endangers the life of the pregnant person or would lead to “substantial and irreversible impairment of major bodily function.”

The news was immediately met with backlash, with the masses calling the bill what it is: an abortion ban.

The legislature cuts of access to abortion at six weeks, though people often don’t even know they are pregnant before that time. Abortion rights advocates estimate that, in Texas, 85 to 90 percent of women needing an abortion are at least six weeks into pregnancy.

A compounding issue surrounding this legislation revolves around the bounty-style enforcement of the law, allowing private residents only to sue, making it harder to challenge in court now that it’s been approved by the Supreme Court and ultimately leading to a precedent that other states could replicate if they want to effectively ban most abortions, with the possibility of applying this standard to other areas of the law.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki has since said President Biden is calling on Congress to pass legislation to protect Americans’ right to an abortion.

“Our focus, and the president’s focus, is—to reiterate—our deep commitment to the constitutional right, of course, established by Roe v. Wade nearly five decades ago, and to continue to call for the codification of Roe, something that the president talked about on the campaign trail, the vice president talked about on the campaign trail,” Psaki responds when asked about Biden’s response to the Texas bill. “This highlights even further the need to move forward on that.”

Psaki and the White House also very clearly were not caught up in the technicalities the Supreme Court referenced, reading a statement from Biden saying the bill is “extreme” and that it blatantly violates the constitutional right to an abortion, adding that it denies healthcare to people in need and will particularly hurt low-income people and people of color. She also pointed to the specific structure of the law, saying it “deputizes citizens” to turn each other in, even though they have no real connection to the abortion, for a monetary reward.

However, passing a new law in Congress could fall victim to a filibuster, which continually kills many major administration initiatives, like bills protecting voting rights and the Equality Act. There are 50 democrats and 50 republicans in the Senate, though the filibuster requires 60 votes for a bill to pass, meaning at least 10 republican senators must vote for a bill for it to pass, also highly unlikely given the GOP’s stance on abortion they have long stood by to get votes.

This is a developing story. Stick with OFM for ongoing updates.