(CTN News) – The Supreme Court cleared the path for Idaho hospitals to conduct emergency abortions but left important points unaddressed, potentially leading to the case being revisited by the conservative-majority court.
The order was unintentionally posted on the court’s website on Wednesday and quickly withdrawn. By a 6-3 vote, the court overturned a previous decision that permitted an Idaho abortion ban to go into effect, even in medical crises.
Abortion is a hot topic in the 2024 election campaign
Abortion is a hot topic in the 2024 election campaign as a direct outcome of the court’s earthquake decision two years ago that invalidated the nationwide right to abortion. However, in this decision and another that protected access to abortion medicine, the court refrained from issuing comprehensive rulings.
The Idaho order fails to address critical questions regarding whether doctors can perform emergency abortions abroad, a significant issue given that most Republican-controlled states have sought to ban the procedure.
In Texas, an appeals court ruled that a state’s abortion restriction takes precedence over federal health care laws. Complaints of pregnant patients being turned away from emergency rooms in Texas increased after the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to federal documents obtained by The Associated Press (AP).
The Supreme Court heard the Idaho case after the Biden administration sued to allow abortions in emergencies where a woman’s health was at risk. Idaho had contended that its statute permits life-saving abortions and that the federal government was incorrectly advocating for broader exclusions.
However, the contours of the case have shifted in the months since the court agreed to consider it, noted Justice Amy Coney Barrett in a concurrence signed by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
“I am now convinced that these cases are no longer appropriate for early resolution,” Barrett said, citing Idaho’s abortion restriction amendments and the Biden administration’s clarification that emergency abortions would only be allowed in rare situations. Kavanaugh and Barrett were the majority members who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson argued that the court should have made a decision sooner, claiming that its earlier ruling caused Idaho doctors to watch patients suffer or be evacuated out of state for treatment.
“While this court delays and the country waits, pregnant people with emergency medical conditions remain in a precarious position,” she remarked, emphasizing her point by reading a summary of her ruling out in court. “This court had a chance to bring clarity and certainty to this tragic situation, and we have squandered it.”
Her fellow liberals supported the dismissal.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre stated, “No woman should be denied care, forced to flee her home state, or forced to wait until she is near death in order to receive the healthcare she requires.”
Conservative Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote the Dobbs v. Jackson ruling that overturned Roe, criticized the decision to dismiss the case now. He and Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas proposed that the court side with Idaho. “Conclusively shows that federal health care law does not require hospitals to perform abortions,” he wrote.
The opinion’s premature release marked the second time in two years that an abortion ruling was issued early, albeit under different circumstances. Politico obtained a copy of the court’s momentous decision that ended the constitutional right to an abortion.
President Joe Biden stated that the court’s Wednesday injunction guarantees that Idaho women receive the necessary care while the lawsuit is ongoing.
“Doctors should be allowed to practice medicine. Patients should be able to access the services they require,” he stated.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre stated, “No woman should be denied care, forced to flee her home state, or forced to wait until she is near death in order to receive the healthcare she requires.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland stated that the Justice Department will continue to pursue its lawsuit and use “every available tool to ensure that women in every state have access to that care.”
According to a new poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, approximately 7 in 10 Americans in the United States support protecting abortion access for patients undergoing miscarriages or other pregnancy-related emergencies.
Dr. Kara Cadwallader, a family medicine doctor in Boise, said she hopes the decision would allow for adequate medical care when a patient’s health is jeopardized in Idaho.
She described a pregnant patient whose membranes ruptured halfway through her pregnancy, putting her at risk of bleeding to death and sepsis. An Idaho hospital refused to care for her because she needed an abortion and instead advised her to travel out of the state.
Cadwallader said it took the patient two weeks to schedule an appointment in Seattle. Now, individuals like her can receive therapy in Idaho.
“That is incredibly important for those of us on the ground actually seeing patients, because we’ve been shipping these patients out of state unnecessarily for something we could be easily taking care of for them here at home,” she told me.
Abortion rights advocates said the decision would provide temporary comfort but left “devastating” uncertainty about the bigger issue. “This fight is far from over,” stated Alexa Kolbi-Molinas, Deputy Director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project.
Idaho State Attorney General Raúl Labrador stated that the Biden administration‘s attitude has altered to be “far more modest” than it looked when the case was initially filed. He said that Idaho could enforce its statute in most cases, citing Barrett’s concurrence.
Nonetheless, he anticipated the case would return to the Supreme Court for resolution. “We feel pretty strongly we’re going to win this case in the end,” he told me.
The Biden administration has also challenged the Texas emergency abortion verdict to the Supreme Court, providing another path for the issue to resurface. The justices are unlikely to determine whether to hear the Texas case until the fall.