Yesterday, U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman granted a request by the Department of Justice to block enforcement of Texas' draconian anti-choice law that would effectively outlaw abortions after 6 weeks (a de facto ban) and rely on private bounty hunters to enforce the edict. There was no provision in the law even for cases of rape or incest. In addition, Texas' law is deeply unpopular with the public, as a poll just days ago demonstrates.
It's the first blow against the extremist law in what is expected to be a fight all the way to the Supreme Court. In his 113 page opinion, Judge Pitman blasted Texas' "contrived" law:
"A person’s right under the Constitution to choose to obtain an abortion prior to fetal viability is well established. Fully aware that depriving its citizens of this right by direct state action would be flagrantly unconstitutional, the State contrived an unprecedented and transparent statutory scheme to do just that. The State created a private cause of action by which individuals with no personal interest in, or connection to, a person seeking an abortion would be incentivized to use the state’s judicial system, judges, and court officials to interfere with the right to an abortion. Rather than subjecting its law to judicial review under the Constitution, the State deliberately circumvented the traditional process. It drafted the law with the intent to preclude review by federal courts that have the obligation to safeguard the very rights the statute likely violates." (our emphasis)
Texas has asked the Court for a stay in granting an injunction until it had an opportunity to appeal, which Judge Pitman forcefully shot down:
".....the State has requested, in the event the Court preliminarily enjoins enforcement of S.B. 8, that the Court stay any injunction until the State has the opportunity to seek appellate review. The State has forfeited the right to any such accommodation by pursuing an unprecedented and aggressive scheme to deprive its citizens of a significant and well-established constitutional right. From the moment S.B. 8 went into effect, women have been unlawfully prevented from exercising control over their lives in ways that are protected by the Constitution. That other courts may find a way to avoid this conclusion is theirs to decide; this Court will not sanction one more day of this offensive deprivation of such an important right." (our emphasis)
Texas intends to appeal to the conservative-majority Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, where the outcome of the appeal may be more favorable to the misogynist extremists in Texas.
