The court ruled that the lower court made a mistake in ruling that the woman, Kate Cox, who is more than 20 weeks pregnant, was entitled to a medical exception.
…
Ms. Cox asked the lower court for approval after she learned that her fetus had a fatal condition, and after several trips to the emergency room.
In short, the life or health exemptions to abortion bans in Republican-controlled states are meaningless.
When this sort of thing happened in Kansas, Kansas enshrined abortion rights in their constitution.
When this sort of thing happened in Ohio, Ohio enshrined abortion rights in their constitution.
Texas politicians want to fuck around, they will find out.
Only states which were controlled by progressives in the early 20th century have the ability for voters to use a ballot initiative to override the Legislature like that. Much of the country has no such safety mechanism.
And the legislature has likely been severely jerrymandered into permanency. We have no hope here in Indiana.
Yeah, fixing it nationally requires taking control over the US Supreme Court and changing the rulings which deem partisan gerrymandering acceptable.
I don’t know if I feel optimistic about that or not. I lived in Houston for a couple years. Republicans have such a stranglehold over the state that I’m not sure a referendum would be successful like it was in other red states.
That said, there was also a common line by Texas Democrats that it wasn’t a red state, but a non voting state. With that model, it’s possible for the Republican to raise so much opposition that the traditional non voters sweep the Republicans away for going too far.
Republicans have a similar stranglehold on both Kansas and Ohio, but the party has a significant split on abortion issues. An awful lot of Republicans see it as a personal freedom issue rather than a “baby murder” issue.
Hardliners like Ken Paxton really aren’t helping the “pro-life” camp.
I hope you’re right.