The highest court issued an “administrative stay” cfreezing other court decisions until Wednesday night to allow parties to present their argumentsreported AFP.
Hours earlier, the Joe Biden government had filed a last-minute appeal with the Supreme Court requesting that it urgently intervene to preserve access to this pill, in another twist in the legal battle over reproductive rights.
By taking the issue before the country’s highest court, the Biden administration urged a freeze on recent rulings that would ban or place limits on the use of the drug mifepristone.
“Lower court orders will change the status quo and disrupt the complex regulatory regime governing mifepristone,” said the attorney general, Elizabeth Foreword, in a 47-page document.
“Such a disruptive outcome would profoundly harm women, the nation’s health care system, the FDA (the US drug regulatory agency) and the public interest,” he added.
In combination with another drug, mifepristone is used for more than half of all abortions in the United States, and more than 5 million American women have already taken it since its approval by the FDA, the drug’s regulatory body. more than two decades ago.
The judicial saga began last week. A federal judge in Texas, Matthew Kacsmaryk, ordered a nationwide ban on mifepristone on April 7 in response to a lawsuit by a coalition of anti-abortion groups that challenged the drug’s FDA approval in 2000.
On April 12, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit partially reversed Kacsmaryk’s decision: said mifepristone, also known as RU 486, should remain temporarily available pending a final decision. But he limited access to the first seven weeks of pregnancy, instead of 10, and blocked distribution by mail.
Now, the Justice Department said the initial ruling by Kacsmaryk, a judge appointed by former Republican President Donald Trump, was based on a “deeply flawed assessment of the safety of mifepristone” and also disagreed with the Fifth Circuit’s decision.
In its request, the Government asked the Supreme Court, where the conservatives have a 6-3 majority, for a “stay” of the Fifth Circuit’s ruling “to preserve the status quo”, pending an examination of the merits of the case.
In this context, one of the two companies that market mifepristone in the United States, the Danco laboratory, also requested the intervention of the Supreme Court on its side, warning that there is a risk of creating “regulatory chaos throughout the country.”
The company noted that also on April 7 another federal court, located in the state of Washington, ruled that access to mifepristone must be maintained, in response to a lawsuit by 17 US states governed by Democrats.
More than a dozen states have passed laws banning or severely restricting abortion since the Supreme Court struck it down in June 2022. the landmark ruling Roe v. Wade that had enshrined the constitutional right to abortion for almost half a century throughout the country. Since the repeal, states have been free to legislate on the issue.
The most recent case was Florida, one of the most populous states in the United States, where Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law Thursday banning most abortions after six weeks, before many women know they are pregnant.
Currently, abortion is now prohibited in 15 states of the country. However, there are options for women: organizations mobilize to supply abortion pills from abroad or from other states, and they are also sold online.
A clear majority of Americans support maintaining access to safe abortions, public opinion polls show time and time again.
Source: Ambito
