Justice restores Texas abortion restriction law

The legal battle is raging in the United States. A federal appeals court allowed Texas to reinstate its law banning the majority of abortions on Friday, October 8, two days after the controversial provision was banned. This highly restrictive law, which went into effect on September 1, bans abortion as soon as the fetus’s heartbeat is detected, at about six weeks of pregnancy, when most women do not know they are pregnant.

The law was temporarily blocked by a federal judge in Texas on Wednesday after a complaint from the Joe Biden government. Then, six weeks later, abortions resumed in state clinics. The Texas attorney general had appealed to the federal court in New Orleans, considered one of the most conservative in the country, which ruled in his favour.

In all likelihood, the US federal government will challenge the decision of the Court of Appeals to the US Supreme Court. The latter in 1973, in its symbolic ruling by Roe v Wade, guaranteed a woman’s right to an abortion. She has since clarified that this right applies as long as the fetus is not viable, around 22 weeks of gestation.