High court review of Louisiana abortion case could revive overturned Texas law
AUSTIN — Texas abortion supporters and opponents are awaiting a U.S. Supreme Court decision that could have ripple effects on women’s access to the procedure nationwide.
The high court agreed this month to review a Louisiana law enacted in 2014 that requires abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a hospital within a 30-mile radius.
It’s the same requirement the court struck down in 2016, the landmark Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt decision that overturned a 2013 Texas law. The 5-3 ruling set a new legal standard requiring courts to weigh the benefits of abortion restrictions against the burden they impose on women.
The Louisiana case will be the first to test abortion rights since President Donald Trump appointed two conservative justices to the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.
“What concerns me the most is the new court’s motivation to relitigate Whole Woman’s Health,” Amy Hagstrom Miller, CEO and founder of Whole Woman’s Health, told The Dallas Morning News. “What’s at stake here in the Louisiana case are issues that were already decided in Whole Woman’s Health.”
Abortion rights groups in Texas say the Supreme Court should have tossed the lawsuit based on the Hellerstedt precedent, but opponents hope a decision in Louisiana’s favor could embolden lawmakers in Texas and elsewhere to try to pass laws restricting the procedure.
“We believe the Texas law in question during the 2016 ruling was constitutional,” said Becky Visosky, the executive director of the Catholic Pro-Life Community of Dallas. “If the court decides to revisit these issues, we welcome that opportunity.”
In the Texas case, Whole Woman’s Health challenged the state’s requirements for abortion providers to have hospital admitting privileges and for all clinics to comply with ambulatory surgical center standards.
Six abortion clinics in Texas shuttered when the requirements first went into effect in 2013. Women in El Paso and McAllen were forced to travel as many as 300 miles for abortions, Hagstrom Miller said.
Geography may again be a deciding factor in the case, said Josh Blackman, a professor at South Texas College of Law Houston. The court will have to decide whether the distance women would have to travel in Louisiana is as big of a burden as it would be in Texas, he said.
Critics of the Louisiana law argue that only one doctor has been able to fulfill this requirement and that it could shut down two of the three abortion clinics in Louisiana, The Advocate reported.
Still, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans upheld the Louisiana law in 2016, citing distinctions in the cases.
“Unlike Texas, Louisiana presents some evidence of a minimal benefit,” Judge Jerry E. Smith wrote for the majority. “The admitting privileges requirement performs a real, and previously unaddressed, credentialing function that promotes the well-being of women seeking abortion.”