By Daniel Wiessner
Oct 30 (Reuters) – A US appeals court on Friday paused a judge’s ruling that said Idaho’s near-total ban on abortion is unconstitutional because it does not provide exceptions for when pregnancies pose risks to women’s health.
The San Francisco-based 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals said in a 2-1 decision that a doctor who sued over Idaho’s abortion ban is unlikely to prevail on claims that the US Constitution protects the right to a health-saving abortion.
The US Supreme Court in 2022 overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that had legalized abortion nationwide, and in doing so stated that there is no right to an abortion under the US Constitution.
In a concurring opinion on Friday, 9th Circuit Judge Kim Wardlaw said that means there is no right to an abortion in any specific circumstance, “particularly one as vague and ill-defined as the right pressed here.” The court’s order, in which Wardlaw joined Circuit Judge Consuelo Callahan, was unsigned.
The court lifted a federal judge’s August ruling ordering Idaho to allow abortions in cases where a doctor deemed it necessary to protect the mother’s health, pending the outcome of the state’s appeal. The judge had subsequently limited his ruling to bar enforcement only against the plaintiff, Stacey Seyb, pending the state’s appeal.
That ruling was the first by a US judge to recognize a constitutional right to abortion in certain circumstances since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
IDAHO ATTORNEY GENERAL APPLAUDS RULING
Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador, a Republican, applauded the ruling in a statement.
“Idaho’s unwavering protection for unborn children and their mothers will continue as intended,” he said.
Stephanie Toti, a lawyer for Seyb and the executive director of legal nonprofit Lawyering Project, said the decision was only a temporary setback.
“We look forward to demonstrating to the appeals court that access to medically indicated abortion care is deeply rooted in our nation’s history and tradition and essential to its scheme of ordered liberty,” Toti said in a statement.
Idaho and a dozen other states have banned virtually all abortions, and several other states have severely restricted them, since the Supreme Court ruling.
The decision lifted on Friday had blocked enforcement of two Idaho laws to the extent that they prohibited doctors from providing abortion care to patients with serious medical conditions, including mental health conditions that can raise the risk of self-harm and suicide.
DISSENTING JUDGE WARNS OF HEALTH RISKS
In a dissenting opinion, Circuit Judge Marsha Berzon said the 2022 Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade dealt explicitly only with elective abortions.
“Some women with serious pregnancy complications will during the pendency of this appeal be required to continue their pregnancies at serious, permanent risk to their health,” wrote Berzon.
Wardlaw and Berzon are appointees of former President Bill Clinton, a Democrat. Callahan was appointed by Republican former President George W. Bush.
The ruling comes amid separate litigation over whether a federal emergency-care law requires hospitals to provide abortions to stabilize patients in some circumstances despite Idaho’s ban. The US Supreme Court in 2024 allowed such emergency abortions to resume without resolving that dispute, and the Trump administration later dropped the federal government’s case.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York, Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi and Matthew Lewis)
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