Center Attorney Talks Texas on NPR
A federal appeals court ruled earlier this week to uphold the Texas law that puts most of the state’s abortion clinics at risk of closure. The court reasoned that women in need of abortion care could always travel to a neighboring state for those services.
Stephanie Toti, lead attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights in the case challenging the sweeping anti-choice law, discussed the case with NPR. She pointed out the inconsistencies in the court’s argument and the obvious pretextual nature of the Texas law, which claims to be concerned with protecting women’s health:
The ruling is absurd because the court is essentially saying if you want to have an abortion you have to travel to other states that don’t have these laws. The court is essentially recognizing that these laws don’t provide any health or safety benefit. The point is to try to make Texas an abortion-free state.
The Center plans to appeal the ruling at the U.S. Supreme Court. Without the Court’s immediate intervention, all but eight Texas clinics will be forced to close on July 1 when the law’s mandate takes effect, leaving more than a million women at least 150 miles from the nearest abortion provider.