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U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Monday that the federal government will take action to protect people in Texas who attempt to obtain abortions following the entry into force of the strictest anti-abortion law in the States- United last week.
The US Department of Justice has said it will not tolerate violence against anyone seeking abortion services in the state and that federal officials are exploring all options to challenge the ban on nearly all interruptions, the new state law also allows the public to enforce the law in a way critics denounce the promotion of self-defense.
Curious to see how everyone who has trumpeted their concerns for the safety and rights of women in Afghanistan is doing perfectly well to unleash a self-defense group of rogue bounty hunters on women in America. #BansOffOurBodies https://t.co/7z6BTPyo0W
– Dr Hiral Tipirneni (@ hiral4congress) September 2, 2021
Garland issued a statement that the DoJ would “protect those seeking to obtain or provide reproductive health services” under federal law known as the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (or Face) Act.
Garland said federal prosecutors are still urgently considering ways to challenge Texas law and that the DoJ will enforce federal law “to protect the constitutional rights of women and others, including access to abortion. “.
The most radical abortion law in the United States came into effect on September 1 after the United States Supreme Court failed to intervene before the August 31 deadline to block it, after an appeal from emergency before the highest court, despite concerted legal campaigns.
Texas’ near-total abortion ban allows any private citizen to sue an abortion provider or anyone deemed to have helped a woman get an abortion against the law, but not the patient herself.
Critics have said he is opening the floodgates to a harassing and frivolous lawsuits from anti-abortion vigilantes who could eventually shut down most of the state’s dwindling number of clinics. Texas law also leaves the landmark Roe v Wade Supreme Court case that paved the way for the legalization of abortion in the United States in 1973 hanging by a thread.
Federal law commonly known as the Face Act, on the other hand, prohibits physically obstructing or using the threat of force to intimidate or interfere with anyone seeking reproductive health services.
The law also prohibits damaging property in abortion clinics and other reproductive health centers.
Texas’ new law prohibits abortions once medical professionals can detect heart activity, usually about six weeks – before some women know they are pregnant.
Courts have ruled out other states from imposing similar restrictions, but Texas law differs significantly as it leaves enforcement to private citizens through lawsuits instead of criminal prosecutors, in part to avoid legal scrutiny.
Department of Justice officials have also been in contact with prosecutors, including US attorneys in Texas and the FBI’s field offices in the state, to discuss the application of federal provisions.
“The department will provide federal law enforcement support when an abortion clinic or reproductive health center is attacked,” Garland said.
“We will not tolerate violence against those seeking to obtain or provide reproductive health services, physical obstruction or property damage in violation of the Face Act.”
After failing to intervene before the law came into force, the five-vote Conservative majority in the Supreme Court then ruled in the emergency case, refusing to block the law, with all three liberal justices issuing dazzling dissent and being joined by Chief Justice John Roberts.
Joe Biden called the law unconstitutional and pledged his administration’s efforts to counter its effects as quickly as possible.
The Supreme Court’s overnight ruling is an unprecedented assault on constitutional rights and requires an immediate response.
We’ll launch a whole-of-government effort to respond, looking at steps we can take to ensure Texans have access to safe and legal abortions.
– Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) September 2, 2021
But there is a limit to what the federal government can do.
Even if SCOTUS does eventually “rule out” the Texas abortion ban, it will take months, depriving many women of their constitutional right. Imagine a law prohibiting all possession of firearms, enforceable through rewards for bounty hunters. Would it be okay to wait months to stop it? https://t.co/5hewH3wdZf
– Barb McQuade (@BarbMcQuade) September 6, 2021
Ironically, Merrick Garland would have been a Supreme Court justice if Barack Obama had been able to pass his candidacy when he was president. But then Senate Majority Leader and Kentucky Republican Mitch McConnell blocked the process and the post he was chosen to fill, following Antonin Scalia’s death, went to Donald Trump’s choice. after the latter won the White House.
After Biden won the 2020 election, beating Trump, he appointed Garland to become his attorney general.
The person who SHOULD be on SCOTUS to protect women’s rights will now do so from their current position. Well done Mr. Garland. https://t.co/kSqtK7zkX5
– TR: Liberal from Texas (@ trwill1957) September 6, 2021
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