Arizona Judge Permanently Blocks State’s 15-Week Abortion Ban, Declaring it Unconstitutional

An Arizona judge permanently blocked the state’s 15-week abortion ban on March 5, declaring it unconstitutional under a 2024 voter-approved amendment enshrining abortion rights into the state’s constitution. 

The Center for Reproductive Rights and its partners brought the case in December on behalf of Arizona abortion providers to ensure the state’s laws aligned with the amendment, known as the Arizona Abortion Access Act.  

The Act created a “fundamental right” to receive abortion care up until fetal viability, with exceptions after that to “protect the life or physical or mental health of the pregnant individual,” and was approved more than two years after the state’s abortion ban took effect. 

 “Today’s ruling is a people’s victory. Arizona voters made clear in November that they want their fundamental reproductive rights protected, including abortion access,” said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center. “This is democracy at work. Patients and providers can finally move forward without the lingering threat of this unjust ban.”

The Arizona attorney general had agreed in December not to enforce the ban, agreeing it was unconstitutional under the Act and allowing doctors across the state to resume providing abortion care to patients after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Today’s order by the Maricopa County Superior Court judge permanently blocks the ban. 

Arizona Abortion Ban Took Effect in 2022 After the U.S. Supreme Court Overturned Roe 

After nearly a half century of legal pre-viability abortion in Arizona, in March 2022 the state legislature passed S.B. 1164, which criminalized virtually all abortion care after 15 weeks into pregnancy, except in narrowly defined medical emergencies. Physicians who “intentionally or knowingly” violated the ban would be guilty of a felony and also subject to severe civil penalties and license revocation.

The ban took effect in September 2022, after the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2022 ruling eliminating the federal constitutional right to abortion. 

“For nearly three years, my hands were tied because of this cruel ban. It is a relief to no longer have to turn away patients from essential health care,” said long-time Center client and plaintiff Dr. Paul Isaacson, M.D., obstetrician and gynecologist at the Family Planning Associates Medical Group. “All Arizonans deserve to make their own health care decisions with their doctors, without political interference. I will continue to provide the full spectrum of reproductive health care my patients need for their health and their futures—including abortion.” 

The case, Reuss v. Arizona, was brought by Dr. Eric M. Reuss, M.D., M.P.H., Dr. Paul A. Isaacson, M.D., and Planned Parenthood Arizona, Inc., represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Arizona, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the Center for Reproductive Rights, and Perkins Coie LLP.