The Texas abortion ban is likely headed for the Supreme Court — again.
On Thursday, the Department of Justice filed a lawsuit in Austin, asking that the law be invalidated under the 14th Amendment and the Supremacy Clause.
This either destroys the Republican Party or it destroys the Republic.
SCOTUS had better start being concerned with its reputation and legitimacy.
I’m just here to point out that there is plainly and obviously state action in this statute that can be enjoined. First of all, anybody bringing one of these suits is acting as an agent of the State of Texas by going to court to enforce the Texas law prohibiting post-“heartbeat” abortions. Second, the law strictly prohibits the state, any political subdivision, or any officer or employee of it from seeking to enforce the law, but then it immediately carves out an exception for anybody involved in enforcing the “civil” remedy provided by the statute. And who might that be? The Texas state courts, of course. They’re unquestionably state actors.
Here’s the relevant text:
Sec. 171.207. LIMITATIONS ON PUBLIC ENFORCEMENT.
(a) Notwithstanding Section 171.005 or any other law, the
requirements of this subchapter shall be enforced exclusively
through the private civil actions described in Section 171.208. No
enforcement of this subchapter, and no enforcement of Chapters 19
and 22, Penal Code, in response to violations of this subchapter,
may be taken or threatened by this state, a political subdivision, a
district or county attorney, or an executive or administrative
officer or employee of this state or a political subdivision
against any person, except as provided in Section 171.208.
(b) Subsection (a) may not be construed to:
(1) legalize the conduct prohibited by this subchapter
or by Chapter 6-1/2, Title 71, Revised Statutes;
(2) limit in any way or affect the availability of a
remedy established by Section 171.208; or
(3) limit the enforceability of any other laws that
regulate or prohibit abortion.I wonder who the four new SCJs will be in 2023?
They haven’t since Bush v. Gore.
To me the most important question is what happens if the law is upheld. What are both the political and more importantly actual affect on citizens of either formally overturning Roe or distinguishing it to a point it is irrelevant.
Not wanting to get into the constitutional discussion, because I don’t think it matters.
That is those who are making the decision do not much care what the constitution says. Rather, for enough of them it will either be a political or religious decision and the constitution be damned.
Noting that to be honestly against abortion, you must be pro-choice, as in choice of health care, choice of day care, choice of education, choice job training and above all choice of contraception. All choices that those who are trying to outlaw abortion oppose.
The affect on people I fear is a return to the days before Roe, when you constantly heard on the news about “backroom butchers”, most hospitals having entire wards dedicated the care of mostly young women being harmed if not killed by back ally or self abortions and everyone knowing someone or someone’s sister who was harmed or killed by an illegal abortion.
Furthermore, well I hate slippery slope arguments, I think there needs to be a real concern that the attacks on abortion are a larger attack on women’s health and rights, especially birth control. Birth control allows all women to have an option other than marriage and dependency on men or forgoing intimacy. That is if you take away birth control you take away the opportunity for women to have it all, a job and a family and be equal and independent of men.
The political question is harder to answer. In discussing the politics of abortion an important fact must be presented. That fact is that Ronald Reagan is far beyond all other presidents as being the most pro-abortion president in American history who as governor signed the first and today still the most permissive bill legalizing abortion, appointed Supreme Court justices to assure Roe would remain the law of the land and followed policies that were against choice and therefore cause abortion demand to greatly increase during his term as president.
Since Reagan, Republicans at the national level have gone on record as being against abortion and followed Reagan’s policies of keeping abortion legal and by opposing choice, more frequent than Democrats.
That is Republicans and therefore Republican women have been able to support Republicans claiming to want to outlaw abortion while supporting legal and frequent abortions. So my guess and even more my hope is that at the very least this will end the successful Republican political strategy at the national level to say they are against abortion without any political consequences.
Will the political result of all this end up with Republicans, and especially Republican women, being able to still keep abortion legal while still claiming to want to make it illegal. That is will, in the end, the Supreme Court find a way to merely continue chipping away at Roe in a way that does not cause women who vote Republican to become afraid of losing important rights or is the game finally up and Republicans must either live with truly being against women’s rights or will it be able to continue the fraud of the last 40 years.
Gaetz, Gym, Cruz, Graham.
SCJ does not stand for Seditious Criminal Jerkoffs.
…
yet.
Surely if it’s okay for Texas to ban a medical procedure (invasive much?) and deprive folks of their 14th rights then it’s okay for other states to strip away 2nd amendment rights and start up a free lottery to turn in ‘gangstas’ that buy but don’t report their toys, right?
The 6 Conservative Justices Political Operatives really, really want to ban all abortions. What they don’t want is a full review with oral arguments and a signed written decision nullifying 50 years of access vis-à-vis Row vs Wade.
The Texas law (and the Shadow docket) allows the cowardly bast*rds to make the Row decision legal but unenforceable, thus avoiding the political heat that will cook them in future elections if they out right allow States to ban all abortions. GLWTS.
The majority both couldn’t hide its impatience to strike down Roe but also wanted to do so in the middle of the night – by not acting rather than acting – and that somehow no one would notice.
People noticed.
The law prevents abortion after 6 weeks claiming a “heartbeat” is present at that time. So here we go with a medical / legal clash. There’s no fetal heartbeat at 6 weeks. There’s not even a fetus. It’s an embryo at that stage with a clump of cells destined to be a heart that vibrate with electrical current. But no heart is present to beat. Nor can you be certain if a woman is past 6 weeks. The usual way to determine the time past conception is an algorithm based on the first missed period. Could be 4 weeks or 8. But called 6
So what does the law do when it’s language is challenged along medical lines?
Something something horse already left the barn…
Pirro, Judy, Milian, and Wapner’s corpse…
Take one guess how the statute defines “fetal heartbeat.” Then decide whether you’re willing to take that risk.
I know how the medical profession defines fetal heartbeat…a detectable sinus wave. A QRS on an EKG.
Who trumps whom?
When Roberts eviscerated the Voting Rights Act he avoided the political heat by saying the Court was powerless to remedy the problem he created, that is the exclusive province of the Legislative branch. I can see the Sanctimonious Six adopting RBG’s argument that Roe was improperly decided as a privacy issue, ignoring her equal protection argument, and then passing the buck to Congress and state legislatures to solve the problem.
The statutory definition is going to prevail over any other. That’s why they defined it in the act.
was thinking Sydney Powell, Cleta Mitchell, Kayleigh and Kelly Anne.
That they support with:
Sec. 171.202. LEGISLATIVE FINDINGS. The legislature finds, according to contemporary medical research, that:
(1) fetal heartbeat has become a key medical predictor that an unborn child will reach live birth;
(2) cardiac activity begins at a biologically identifiable moment in time, normally when the fetal heart is formed in the gestational sac;