NPR reports:
The U.S. Supreme Court late Wednesday night refused to block a Texas law banning abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. The vote was 5-to-4, with three Trump-appointed justices joining two other conservative justices. Dissenting were conservative Chief Justice John Roberts, and the court’s three liberal justices.
The decision left open the option for abortion providers to challenge the Texas law in other ways in the future, leaving open the possibility–even likelihood– that the case will return to the Supreme Court, though not for months or longer.
The opinion was unsigned. It said the abortion providers didn’t properly address “complex and novel antecedent procedural questions” in their case.
CNN reports:
The majority stressed that it had not formed a conclusion about the constitutionality of the law — despite the order coming nearly 24 hours after the law, the tightest abortion restrictions since the 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade, took effect.
“In particular, this order is not based on any conclusion about the constitutionality of Texas’s law, and in no way limits other procedurally proper challenges to the Texas law, including in Texas state courts,” the majority wrote.
There were several dissents. In one, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by her two liberal colleagues, called the majority’s order “stunning.”
The Supreme Court ended Roe v Wade & endorsed vigilante justice today all without lifting a gavel.
Add the loss of voting rights and we are one step closer to the vision of America in the 1800s.
— Andy Slavitt ??? (@ASlavitt) September 2, 2021
By a 5–4 vote, the Supreme Court just allowed Texas to enforce a law that prohibits abortions after six weeks, with no exception for rape or incest. Roe v. Wade is, functionally, overturned. Justice Sotomayor all but says it. https://t.co/elazEg3xdZ pic.twitter.com/KOSJZRIUMk
— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC) September 2, 2021
The same party that demands “freedoms” just offered Texas vigilantes $10,000 bounties to turn in their neighbors who seek abortions. And the Supreme Court greenlit this.
Vote in 2022 like your life depends on it. Because it does.
— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) September 2, 2021