DFLA Press Release on Supreme Court Ruling in Texas Case
Washington, D.C.-- Democrats for Life of America (DFLA) welcomes the Supreme Court ruling today allowing the Texas Heartbeat Law to continue in effect. This law has saved preborn lives and will continue to do so.
“We are grateful that this law will continue saving lives while the legal challenges against it wind their way through the lower courts,” said Kristen Day, Executive Director of DFLA.
The latest poll indicated that the heartbeat law is popular in Texas, supported by a 55% majority. 33% of Texas Democrats surveyed said abortion should not be legal after 6 weeks of pregnancy, or that it should only be legal after 6 weeks of pregnancy in cases of rape or incest, or to save the life of the mother. In Texas, 55% of independents support the law, as well as 38% of Democrats. The law is supported by majorities of both women and men in the state.
“The dire predictions made by the proponents of abortion when this law went into effect have not materialized,” said John Quinn, Business Operations Manager, Democrats For Life. “The law has often been characterized–by opponents and by the media–as making it ‘nearly impossible’ for women to obtain abortions in Texas. That is simply not true.”
The most recent initial data (and this is from an institute with pro-abortion leadership) shows that abortions only dropped 50% in the first month the heartbeat law was enacted. A change by half is not equivalent to circumstances where it is “nearly impossible” to procure an abortion. While there are good reasons to anticipate the number of abortions performed in Texas will continue to drop, DFLA invites those who amplified hyperbolic and even apocalyptic rhetoric about the heartbeat law to face these numbers, admit the error of their predictions, and speak more carefully in the future.
DFLA encourages the state of Texas to continue building a culture which is “Pro Life for the Whole Life."
“We applaud Texas’s allotment of $100 million to its important Alternatives to Abortion Program,” said Day. "We call on Texas to pass EMMA legislation, to expand Medicaid, provide for perinatal hospice, expand access to paid leave, provide adequate accommodations in the workplace for pregnant women, and require equal pay for equal work. We call upon Texas to immediately halt scheduled executions and permanently abolish the death penalty."
The Supreme Court made the right decisions this fall when, due to legal novelties, it declined to enjoin the Texas Heartbeat Law. In those decisions, the Court was explicitly not ruling on the constitutionality of the law, but on questions about who (state court judges, state court clerks, private citizens, etc.) can properly be suited in circumstances like this. Today, the Supreme Court continued in that vein: addressing those important legal technicalities and developing and upholding the rule of law. As Justice Gorsuch wrote in his opinion for the Court, “the ultimate merits question–whether S.B. 8 is consistent with the Federal Constitution–is not before the Court.” Today’s ruling is a victory for the constitutional rule of law, as well as for the preborn.
