DES MOINES, Iowa (CN) — A state judge on Monday temporarily blocked enforcement of Iowa’s newly passed six-week abortion ban that was signed into law by Governor Kim Reynolds on July 14.
The suit by Iowa abortion providers challenging the constitutionality of the abortion ban will now be tried on the merits, although it may not reach that stage anytime soon as the governor vowed to appeal Monday’s ruling.
“The abortion industry’s attempt to thwart the will of Iowans and the voices of their elected representatives continues today, but I will fight this all the way to the Iowa Supreme Court where we expect a decision that will finally provide justice for the unborn,” Reynolds said in a statement issued Monday.
Planned Parenthood issued a similar vow to continue its fight to preserve the right to abortion.
“Today’s ruling brings relief to abortion patients who can continue receiving care in Iowa,” said Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. “But this fight is not over. We know that some Iowa politicians are hellbent on banning abortion in defiance of the state constitution, and will keep trying to deny Iowans’ access to essential health care. While these attacks continue, Planned Parenthood and our partners will not back down.”
In granting the injunction, Judge Joseph Seidlin said the court “recognizes that there are good, honorable and intelligent people — morally, politically and legally — on both sides of this upsetting societal and constitutional dilemma. Patience and perseverance are also hallmark traits on both sides, traits that continue to deserve respect. The court believes it must follow current Iowa Supreme Court precedent and preserve the status quo ante while this litigation and adversarial presentation which our Supreme Court has invited moves forward.”
A key issue in the case addressed at length by Judge Seidlin is the standard of review the court should apply in assessing the constitutionality of the abortion law.
The Iowa Attorney General’s office, defending the governor, argued that because the “undue burden” standard adopted by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1992 was overturned by the Dobbs decision in June 2022, the lower standard of “rational basis” must be applied by Iowa courts.
Seidlin disagreed, saying the Iowa Supreme Court has so far not deviated from the undue burden standard and he wrote that it would be an “alarming exercise of judicial activism” for him to say what the Iowa Supreme Court has not.
“Undue burden is where our Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on the issue has left off, with an invitation to litigate the issue further,” he wrote. “This, perhaps, is the litigation that accepts the invitation, and the jurisprudence will pick up again and presumably further refine or define the governing standard.”
Under the undue burden standard, he wrote, “it is readily apparent that the petitioners are likely to succeed” on their claim that the new abortion law violates the due process clause of the Iowa Constitution.
Iowa’s statute, dubbed the “fetal heartbeat” bill and passed in a one-day special legislative session, bans abortions at the point in a pregnancy when an ultrasound test can detect cardiac activity in an embryo, which can be as soon as six weeks after a woman’s last menstrual period.
Planned Parenthood of the Heartland filed suit in Polk County July 12 along with the Emma Goldman Clinic and Planned Parenthood medical director Dr. Sarah Traxler. The abortion providers claim Iowa’s so-called fetal heartbeat law violates the Iowa Constitution.
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