Breyer later added: “Evidence also shows that opposition to abortion played a major role in some hospitals’ decisions to deny admission privileges.”
However, a lot has changed since then, since Kennedy has been replaced by Brett Kavanaugh, who is considered more conservative on the subject. Supporters of abortion rights feared not only that the recent precedent would be in jeopardy, but that the strengthened conservative majority might begin to remove historical views like Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, who defended a woman’s right to abort. .
Roberts wrote a separate concurring opinion also citing Texas law.
“Louisiana law imposes a burden on access to abortion as severe as that imposed by Texas law, for the same reasons. Therefore, Louisiana law cannot be sustained under our precedents,” wrote the chief justice. .
In a dissent, Judge Clarence Thomas again said Roe should be reviewed.
“Roe is seriously wrong for many reasons,” wrote Thomas, but the most fundamental is that its fundamental foundation, that the Constitution protects a woman’s right to abort her unborn child, finds no support in the text of the Fourteenth Amendment. .
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany criticized the ruling as “unfortunate” and targeted the judges who sided with the majority.
“Rather than valuing fundamental democratic principles, unelected judges meddled in the sovereign prerogatives of state governments by imposing their own pro-abortion political preferences to override legitimate abortion safety standards,” McEnany said in a statement. .
The case has been closely watched as multiple largely red states continue to advance restrictions on abortion and largely blue states move to protect access.
None of the nine so-called gestational bans, which prohibit abortions after a certain point in pregnancy, passed last year have gone into effect, after most of them have been blocked by the courts.
Roberts’ footnotes leave an opening
Supporters of abortion rights feared that the Louisiana case would mark the first of what could be a growing number of opportunities for the conservative new majority of the court to offer a plan for states to continue to reduce abortion rights.
But while Roberts upheld the law, in a concurring opinion, the chief justice left the door open that other states could pursue similar restrictions.
In a footnote, he said that “the validity of the admission of privileges law depends on numerous factors that may differ from state to state.”
CNN Supreme Court analyst and University of Texas School of Law professor Stephen Vladeck said Roberts suggested he did not necessarily endorse the analysis of the 2016 decision, which focused so much on whether the restrictions actually provided benefits to pregnant women as if they imposed an undue burden.
“In the process, Vladeck said,” the more limited opinion of the chief justice is that states that present different arguments in different cases may justify similar restrictions in the future. In that sense, the chief justice may have sided with abortion supporters today, but his victory may be short-lived. “
While abortion rights supporters will be pleased that the court has preserved access to abortion in Louisiana, that language has already caused concern.
The Center for Reproductive Rights, which presented the case, addressed the imminent possibility of allowing new state regulations similar to Louisiana’s in a statement Monday morning.
“We are relieved that the Louisiana law has been blocked today, but we are concerned about tomorrow,” said Nancy Northup, the group’s president and chief executive officer.
“(The) court decision could encourage states to pass even more restrictive laws when clarity is needed to protect abortion rights,” said Northup.
Anti-abortion groups denounced the decision and warned of its implications to energize anti-abortion voters in November.
Jeanne Mancini, president of the March for Life, defended the Louisiana law as “designed to safeguard women’s health and safety” and promised a strong demonstration by anti-abortion voters about the decision.
“No abortion center should receive a free pass to provide poor care,” he added. “This decision underscores the importance of nominating and confirming judges who abstain from legislating off the bench, something pro-life voters will certainly remember in November.”
The impact of the law.
The Louisiana Unsafe Abortion Protection Act is an effort, state authorities argued, to “improve the safety of abortion by accrediting a doctor.”
Louisiana Attorney General Elizabeth B. Murrill said clinics in the state have a “troubling” history of serious health and safety problems, and that abortion carries “known risks of serious complications,” although it is largely considers a safe procedure, as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg pointed out during the oral arguments, and that the act would bring the practice of abortion “in conformity” with the privilege requirements for doctors who perform other outpatient surgeries. The fine for violating the law is no more than $ 4,000 per violation.
The Trump administration sided with Louisiana. The law “would not create a substantial obstacle to obtaining an abortion for a large portion of Louisiana women seeking one, let alone all of those women,” Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey Wall argued in court.
The claims were rejected by attorneys from the Center for Reproductive Rights, who represented two doctors and an abortion clinic in the state, who claimed that if the law could have gone into effect when it was passed, it would have forced the closure of two of the three remaining clinics in the state and left only one doctor with the ability to provide abortions.
Louisiana also argued that judges should not consider the constitutionality of the law because the doctors and clinics that present the case do not have the legal right, or “standing,” to be in court. Murrill said Louisiana women can challenge abortion regulations if they wish, “as women have done in many other abortion cases across the country,” but that clinics and doctors cannot replace them. She said that is because the interests of a for-profit business that provides medical services for a fee may not coincide with those of patients seeking abortions.
Julie Rikelman, an attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights, rejected the notion that only women seeking abortions could challenge the law in court, noting that a woman would only have a limited time to file a lawsuit and such litigation often lasts for years. . .
This story has been updated with details of the ruling.
CNN’s Betsy Klein contributed to this report.
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