SCOTUS Won’t Review Court Decision Blocking Alabama 15-Week Abortion Ban

People supporting and opposing abortion demonstrate outside of the Alabama Women's Center for Reproductive Alternatives in Huntsville, Ala., Saturday, Feb. 23, 2013, during a "40 Days of Life Prayer Vigil." (AP Photo... People supporting and opposing abortion demonstrate outside of the Alabama Women's Center for Reproductive Alternatives in Huntsville, Ala., Saturday, Feb. 23, 2013, during a "40 Days of Life Prayer Vigil." (AP Photo/AL.com, Sarah Cole) MAGS OUT MORE LESS
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

The Supreme Court said Friday it won’t review a lower court decision blocking an Alabama law that effectively banned abortions after 15 weeks.

The Alabama law — which prohibits a method of abortion that is typically the only method available for pregnancies after 15 weeks — was passed in 2016. But since then a wave of even more aggressive bans were passed by states who saw Justice Anthony Kennedy’s departure from the court in 2018 as an opportunity to roll back the right to the procedure.

So far, the Supreme Court has declined to jump into the most contentious abortion cases since Kennedy’s exit, but in a concurrence Friday Justice Clarence Thomas signaled his desire to overturn previous decisions protecting abortion rights.

Latest DC

Notable Replies

  1. The chipping away of Roe vs. Wade begins.

  2. Clarence Thomas signaled his desire to overturn previous decisions protecting abortion rights.

    Of course he did. The most incompetent jurist of the last 100 years needs to do as much damage as possible before he kicks his last RV tire.

  3. ? Them rejecting this means that the lower court decision blocking the ban remains in place (i.e. that the law can’t take effect, there’s a lot of double-negatives here…)

  4. Yes, but the narrative is that the Court will overturn Wade the minute it’s able to do so. No matter what, you can’t get the media to do a really proper analysis of it. They immediately default to that assumption.

  5. So, I guess Roberts is chickening out on overturning Roe v. Wade in June 2020, but wants to wait an extra year to avoid the blue tsunami which would surely follow that ruling?

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

66 more replies

Participants

Avatar for valgalky23 Avatar for paulw Avatar for alliebean Avatar for ghost Avatar for littlegirlblue Avatar for construe Avatar for brooklyndweller Avatar for imkmu3 Avatar for clemmers Avatar for cervantes Avatar for maxwellsdemon Avatar for bradbennett Avatar for ronbyers Avatar for jonney_5 Avatar for jacksonhts Avatar for lizzymom Avatar for susanintheoc Avatar for castor_troy Avatar for tiowally Avatar for coimmigrant Avatar for katscherger Avatar for erik_t Avatar for rascal_crone Avatar for missbee

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: