An Abortion Ban Just Got Blocked in Texas

Some clinics will now resume abortions in Texas again, according to the ACLU. 

A state court on Tuesday temporarily blocked the enforcement of an abortion ban, making Texas at least the second state to see abortions start again after Supreme Court’s ruling overturning Roe v. Wade. 

In the days after the Supreme Court’s Friday decision, which demolished the national right to abortion, at least nine states moved to enforce abortion bans, prompting lawsuits in at least five states, including Texas, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which tracks abortion restrictions. On Monday, a Louisiana court agreed to also pause that state’s trigger ban and set a July hearing on the matter.

The blocked Texas ban, however, is not exactly a so-called “trigger ban,” which are meant to ban abortion automatically once Roe is overturned. While Texas does have a trigger ban on the books, the state’s attorney general has said that it will not take effect for roughly two months. Instead, the attorney general has said that abortion providers could be held criminally liable based on “abortion prohibitions predating Roe.”

That pre-Roe ban has now been blocked. The ACLU was among the numerous groups backing the lawsuit over the ban, which was filed on behalf of abortion providers.

In a statement announcing the Texas lawsuit, Dr. Alan Braid, an abortion provider and owner of Alamo Women’s Reproductive Services, said that he plans to provide abortions as long as he legally can.

“I started my medical career before Roe v. Wade and never imagined our country would go back to criminalizing doctors and preventing us from helping women,” Braid said. “Abortion is a standard and necessary part of maternal health care. Nobody should be forced to travel across state lines for basic, time-sensitive health care.”

Even with this temporary pause on the Texas ban, abortions are still only available there up until roughly six weeks of pregnancy. Last year, Texas enacted a law that lets people sue one another over abortions that occur past about that point in pregnancy, devastating abortion access in the state.