AUSTIN, Texas (CN) — The Texas Supreme Court on Friday night temporarily paused an order from a lower court allowing a woman to receive an emergency abortion, following an appeal from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.
The 1-page stay issued by the Texas Supreme Court does not give any reasoning for blocking the lower court judge’s Thursday temporary restraining order against the state and allowing Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother of two from Dallas, to end her pregnancy.
In response to the high court’s action, Molly Duane, senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights representing Cox, said that her client requires urgent medical care.
“While we still hope that the court ultimately rejects the state’s request and does so quickly, in this case we fear that justice delayed will be justice denied,” Duane said in a statement. “This is why people should not need to beg for healthcare in a court of law.”
Cox was 20 weeks pregnant when her fetus was diagnosed with trisomy 18, a condition that has no treatments and is fatal near or shortly after birth. If forced to continue her pregnancy, doctors have warned Cox of potential harm to herself, as well as her ability to become pregnant in the future, which she and her husband intend to do.
Texas’ strict abortion laws have, however, prevented doctors from providing the abortion to Cox, leading to the filing of an emergency lawsuit with Cox, her husband Justin and Damla Karsan, a Houston-area obstetrician, as plaintiffs. They sought a court’s order allowing the procedure to go forward without fear that Karsan, who would be conducting the abortion, and Justin Cox would be prosecuted.
Following a brief hearing on Thursday, Travis County District Court Judge Maya Guerra Gamble granted the plaintiff's application for a temporary restraining order. The order blocked the state of Texas from enforcing its laws against them for 14-days, enough time for Cox to receive the care she sought.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton immediately responded to the restraining order by sending a letter to three Houston-area hospitals where the procedure might take place. In his letter, the anti-abortion Republican told hospital administrators that the order does not insulate them or their staff from prosecution.
Furthermore, Paxton told the hospitals that they may face prosecution because Cox does not qualify for the medical exception to the state’s abortion laws.
“To fall within the medical exception, the physician must determine, ‘in the exercise of reasonable medical judgment, the pregnant female on whom the abortion is performed, induced or attempted has a life-threatening medical condition aggravated by, caused by or arising from a pregnancy that places the female at risk of death or poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function unless the abortion is performed or induced,’” Paxton wrote.
While the state does not believe Cox qualifies under the exception, Duane, at the Center for Reproductive Rights, argues she does. The abortion rights group is also responsible for litigating a similar case involving 20 women who were also denied abortions in Texas and two physicians.
That case, Zurawski v. Texas, is also before the Texas Supreme Court after the attorney general’s office filed an accelerated appeal of a temporary injunction issued by another Austin-area judge, setting a new standard by which physicians determine whether a pregnant patient qualifies for an abortion under the medical exception.
Arguing before the nine-member, all-Republican, high court, Duane said that the medical exception exists only in theory and the state has refused to provide further clarity, leading to the plaintiffs bringing their lawsuit. The state has argued that the laws, as written, are clear and that doctors are to blame for delaying essential medical treatment for pregnant women with emergent conditions.
The state supreme court is expected to issue a ruling in the Zurawski case by June 2024 at the latest.
Physicians face 99 years in prison, a fine of $100,000 and revocation of their medical license if found to have provided an illegal abortion. Additionally, private citizens are permitted to bring civil suits under another abortion ban enacted by the state, with the potential of being awarded a minimum of $10,000 per violation.
Such penalties have led to Texas’ current quandary, where women cannot receive the care they seek from doctors, forcing them to travel to another state to get care or risk the consequences and continue the pregnancy.
Both the Cox and Zurawski cases are the first of their kind following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Whole Women’s Health Organization, which stripped Americans of their constitutional right to abortion. Texas has proven to be the testing ground for new legal challenges to states that have outlawed abortion at all stages. Earlier this year, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed similar lawsuits in Idaho, Tennessee and Oklahoma.
Follow @KirkReportsNews
Subscribe to Closing Arguments
Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.
