A judge in North Dakota must decide whether to temporarily block part of the abortion law that restricts doctors
BISMARCK, N.D. — A North Dakota judge said Wednesday he will decide soon whether to temporarily block part of the state's revised abortion laws so doctors can perform the procedure to save a patient's life or health.
The request for a preliminary injunction asks District Court Judge Bruce Romanick to block the state from enforcing the law against doctors who use their “good faith medical judgment” to perform an abortion because of pregnancy complications that ” could pose a risk of infection. bleeding, high blood pressure, or what otherwise makes continuing a pregnancy unsafe.”
North Dakota bans all abortions except in cases where women may face death or a “serious health risk.” People who perform abortions can be charged with a crime under the law, but patients cannot.
To reduce the risk of prosecution, physicians feel they must delay offering abortions to their patients until the patient's health has deteriorated to the point that other physicians cannot plausibly disagree that it was necessary to have one. to perform an abortion. said lawyer Meetra Mehdizadeh.
“Patients and physicians have suffered significant harm,” she said. “For patients, the denial of their constitutional rights leads to additional health risks; and for physicians, the harm resulting from the threat of criminal prosecution whenever they treat a patient with a medical complication.”
The state's revised abortion laws also provide an exception for pregnancies caused by rape and incest, but only in the first six weeks, before many women know they are pregnant. It also allows the treatment of ectopic and molar pregnancies, which are non-viable situations.
Special Assistant Attorney General Dan Gaustad cited the plaintiffs' “seven-month delay” in seeking a preliminary injunction, and he challenged the language of “good faith medical judgment.” He told the judge that the plaintiffs are asking him to “amend and rewrite the statement under the guise of a preliminary injunction.” The law uses “reasonable medical judgment.”
The Red River Women's Clinic sued the state last year after the U.S. Supreme Court's Dobbs ruling, which overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that established a nationwide right to abortion. The lawsuit called the state's since-repealed trigger ban — a ban that was intended to take effect immediately if the court were to overturn Roe v. Wade — unconstitutional. The clinic moved from Fargo to neighboring Moorhead, Minnesota, where abortion is legal.
A judge issued a preliminary injunction last year blocking the ban from taking effect, which the state Supreme Court upheld in March.
Chief Justice Jon Jensen wrote in the court's March ruling that “it is clear that the citizens of North Dakota have the right to enjoy and defend life, and the right to seek and obtain security, which necessarily implies that a pregnant woman has a fundamental right to obtain an abortion in order to preserve her life or her health.”
Shortly thereafter, North Dakota's Republican-controlled legislature passed a bill to overhaul the state's abortion laws, which Governor Doug Burgum signed into law in April.
In June, the clinic filed an amended complaint along with several physicians in obstetrics, gynecology and maternal-fetal medicine. A jury trial is scheduled for August 2024.