A Judge Just Blocked the Horrible Indiana Law that Would Ban Abortions Sought for the ‘Wrong’ Reasons
The weekend starts with a great bit of news for the women of Indiana, because a federal judge in that state just granted an injunction against a particularly egregious anti-choice law that effectively would have banned abortions if the women weren’t seeking them for what politicians decided were the right reasons.
The law was signed by Governor Mike Pence back in March, and it banned abortion in cases where pregnancy termination was sought because of fetal abnormalities. Down syndrome was one of the genetic abnormalities specified, but it is not the only one this law would have barred. The law would have barred abortion even in the case of fetal abnormalities that would have made survival impossible outside the womb.
For an example of why this law is bad, you should read the Jezebel interview with a woman who terminated a much-wanted pregnancy at 32 weeks. If you have not already read the story of this woman’s heart-wrenching, traumatic ordeal, you should do so, but keep in mind that it will probably make you cry for several hours.
The law also mandated that the only legal way to dispose of aborted fetal tissue was burial or cremation, because it is apparently anti-life to donate fetal tissue to science so doctors can use it to find new ways to save lives.
The law was scheduled to go into effect next Friday, but according to US News and World Report, yesterday Judge Tanya Walton Pratt of the Federal District Court for Southern Indiana granted an injunction against the law, saying that the state did onto have the right to say a woman could only pursue an abortion for certain approved-of reasons. She said that it was unconstitutional and infringed on a woman’s right to privacy. (Judge Pratt cited the recent Supreme Court ruling against Texas’ anti-abortion law as a precedent that informed her ruling, so that SCOTUS ruling is already doing good things for women outside of Texas.)