Abortion clinics in Louisiana can continue to provide abortions while a lawsuit challenging the state’s abortion ban plays out in court, a state judge ruled Thursday.
Judge Donald Johnson of the state’s 19th Judicial District Court in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, issued a preliminary injunction allowing the state’s three remaining abortion clinics to continue operating temporarily while a lawsuit by a north Louisiana abortion clinic and several others continues.
LOUISIANA AG THREATENS TO DELAY FUNDING NEW ORLEANS AMID ABORTION COURT FIGHT
The judge’s decision is the latest in a series of court challenges keeping the legal status of abortions in the state in limbo. The statewide near-total ban on abortions, which prohibits the procedure except when a mother’s life is in danger, has gone into effect twice and been blocked twice.
The order gives both sides 30 days to come up with strategies for a trial that will decide whether the law should be permanently blocked, the Associated Press reported. Providers challenging the state’s abortion laws argue they are vague and contain conflicting language, including whether abortions are prohibited prior to a fertilized egg implanting in the uterus.
Louisiana is one of 13 states with “trigger laws” that went into effect after the Supreme Court reversed nearly 50 years of precedent established under Roe v. Wade following a June 24 opinion release.
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The changing status of Louisiana’s trigger laws is emblematic of a larger trend playing out nationally as abortion providers file court challenges across numerous states to block local laws temporarily from taking effect.
