Supreme Court signals likely to reject challenge to abortion pill access

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: NBC News

SUPREME COURT
Supreme Court signals likely to reject challenge to abortion pill access
The Biden administration is defending FDA decisions that lifted restrictions on mifepristone, including one that made it available by mail.

March 26, 2024, 7:00 AM EDT / Updated March 26, 2024, 12:42 PM EDT
By Lawrence Hurley

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday appeared likely to reject a challenge to the abortion pill mifepristone, with a number of justices indicating the lawsuit should be dismissed. ... The court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, heard oral arguments on the Biden administration's appeal of lower court rulings that restricted women's access to the pill, including its availability by mail. ... But during the arguments, there was little discussion of whether the Food and Drug Administration's decisions to lift restrictions on the drug were unlawful. ... Instead, the justices focused on whether the group of anti-abortion doctors who brought the lawsuit even had legal standing to bring the claim. The plaintiffs, represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian legal group, argue that the FDA failed to adequately evaluate the drug’s safety risks.

But justices, both conservative and liberal, probed whether the doctors could show that they were directly injured merely because they object to abortion and could potentially be required to give emergency room treatment to a woman suffering from serious side effects. ... Several justices also noted that doctors who oppose abortion can already object based on their personal beliefs to assisting patients suffering from abortion-related side effects. ... "Under federal law, no doctors can be forced against their consciences to perform or assist in an abortion, correct?" conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh asked at one point. ... Justice Amy Coney Barrett, another conservative, asked similar questions.

Even if the court were to reach the merits and rule for the challengers, some justices questioned whether the scope of the lower court ruling was too broad by applying it nationwide instead of limiting it to the doctors who sued. ... Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch said the case was a "prime example of turning what could be a small lawsuit into a nationwide legislative assembly on an FDA rule."

The only justices who appeared eager to discuss whether the FDA acted unlawfully and hinted at sympathy for that argument were conservatives Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. ... "Your argument here is that even if the FDA acted unlawfully, nobody can challenge that in court," Alito said in an exchange with Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who represents the FDA. He and Thomas both referred to the Comstock Act, a 19th-century law that prohibited the mailing of drugs used for unlawful abortions. ... Alito also wondered whether the FDA considered itself "infallible."

{snip}

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/supreme-court-weighs-challenge-abortion-pills-widespread-availability-rcna144903

[BumRushDaShow]

1. They better

or they would essentially upend the point of FDA's mission.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. I listened to the oral arguments. Erin Hawley was getting raked over the coals. NT

[BumRushDaShow]

3. I was just scanning SCOTUSBlog and spotted this good excerpt

Abortion access again before Supreme Court
By Amy Howe
on Mar 25, 2024 at 3:39 pm

(snip)

Whether the challengers have standing

There are three separate questions before the justices on Tuesday. The first one is whether the challengers have a legal right to sue, known as standing, at all. The FDA maintains that they do not, because the individual doctors do not prescribe mifepristone and are not obligated to do anything as a result of the FDA’s decision to allow other doctors to prescribe the drug.

The court of appeals held that the medical groups have standing because of the prospect that one of the groups’ members might have to treat women who had been prescribed mifepristone and then suffered complications – which, the FDA stresses, are “exceedingly rare” – requiring emergency care. But the correct test, the FDA and Danco maintain, is not whether the groups’ members will suffer a possible injury, but an imminent injury.

The challengers have not made that showing, the government and Danco insist. The groups suggest that their members could have to treat a patient who was prescribed mifepristone by someone else but then suffers complications requiring emergency care, and it would violate their conscience to complete her abortion. That is not the kind of imminent injury that will confer standing, the FDA writes, “because it rests on a long and speculative chain of contingencies,” and the groups cannot point to a single example of one of their members actually having to provide care in such a situation.

Danco adds that, if the Supreme Court were to rule that the challengers have standing to sue, it would allow other medical groups “to challenge virtually every government regulation that touches on health or safety.” But the implications could be even broader, Danco warns: “Teacher associations could challenge regulations they believe affect students in a way that disrupts the classroom,” or firefighters could “challenge regulations of products they say present fire risks.”

(snip)

https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/03/abortion-access-again-before-supreme-court/

[mahatmakanejeeves]

4. Thomas is itching to get rid of the APA, as you know. He loves to cite his own dissents in that regard. NT

[3Hotdogs]

6. --- and elect more Dems to Congress.

However, we all know that Jesus don't like none'a that abortin' shit that's been goin' on.

[Voltaire2]

5. Alito and Thomas need to test out their profound religious beliefs.

The sooner the better. Tots and pears for their blessed journey.

[Karma13612]

7. Yea, I came to a similar

Conclusion.

I don’t have legal expertise, but I could tell that many of the justices had trouble with the docs who claimed injury. And that their injury meant the entire female population of America should be “injured” to remedy their hurt feefees.

I also question how these docs, if forced to aid the ER patient, thought they were aiding an abortion. At the point of presentation to the ED, the patient is in need of care to avoid death or grave complications. It’s called saving the patient’s life, NOT performing an abortion.

[et tu]

8. well stated!

thomas and alito circa 1300's ~

[mahatmakanejeeves]

9. Supreme Court skeptical of efforts to restrict access to abortion pill

Supreme Court skeptical of efforts to restrict access to abortion pill

By Ann E. Marimow and Caroline Kitchener
March 26, 2024 at 2:08 p.m. EDT

{snip}

The case is Food and Drug Administration v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine.

Daniel Gilbert contributed to this report.

This is a developing story. It will be updated.

By Ann Marimow
Ann Marimow covers the Supreme Court for The Washington Post. She joined The Post in 2005, and has spent a decade writing about legal affairs and the federal judiciary. She previously covered state government and politics in California, New Hampshire and Maryland. Twitter https://twitter.com/amarimow

By Caroline Kitchener
Caroline Kitchener is a reporter covering abortion at The Washington Post. She won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. Twitter https://twitter.com/CAKitchener

[mahatmakanejeeves]

10. Supreme Court to anti-abortion activists: You can't just challenge every policy you don't like

Last edited Wed Mar 27, 2024, 12:05 PM - Edit history (1)

HEALTH CARE
Supreme Court to anti-abortion activists: You can’t just challenge every policy you don’t like

Roughly 90 minutes of grappling over the abortion drug mifepristone produced some unusual and noteworthy moments.



Anti-abortion activists are seen outside the U.S. Supreme Court as justices heard oral arguments in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, a case concerning access to abortion pills, in Washington, on March 26, 2024. | Francis Chung/POLITICO

By JOSH GERSTEIN and ALICE MIRANDA OLLSTEIN
03/26/2024 04:59 PM EDT

The Biden administration’s effort to preserve expanded access to the abortion drug mifepristone found more traction among the conservative justices than many observers expected. Three members of the court’s right flank expressed doubts about the legality and even the wisdom of allowing a coalition of anti-abortion medical groups to challenge the Food and Drug Administration’s conclusions about the safety of mifepristone, the pill used in nearly two-thirds of all abortions.

The Supreme Court arguments Tuesday morning provided windows not only into how the conservative-dominated court may rule in this legal showdown, but on other thorny issues likely to come before the bench in the months and years ahead.

{snip}

[republianmushroom]

11. It shouldn't of ever reached the supreme court.