United States: An Ohio judge permanently struck down the state’s ban on abortion after about six weeks on Thursday and criticized the state’s Republican attorney general for trying to sidestep the will of Ohioans who voted to inscribe abortion protections in the state constitution.
The Republican-backed 2019 state law would interfere with women receiving abortions and discourage doctors from performing them, in violation of a constitutional amendment approved by voters last year, Judge Christian Jenkins of the Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas in Cincinnati said, as reported by Reuters.
Controversial Provisions of the Law
However, the office of Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, a Republican, said while the ban itself could not stand, 14 other provisions of the state law should be upheld.
One of those requirements was that doctors have to check for fetal heartbeats before performing an abortion, that patients attending to abort would be informed when their fetuses are viable, and that patients seeking abortions are required to wait at least 24 hours after being checked by a doctor before they can undergo the abortion.
But those provisions were unconstitutional, Jenkins said because the ballot measure’s broad wording bars any burden in exercising the right to have an abortion.
But in 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down its landmark Roe v. It returned the issue of abortion to individual states, locked away the Wade precedent that had guaranteed abortion rights nationwide, and said ‘women are not without electoral or political power.’
“Unlike the Ohio Attorney General, this court will uphold the Ohio Constitution’s protection of abortion rights.”
Community Response
Yost’s decision will be “very long, very complicated,” and an attorney general has 30 days to review it and appeal, Bethany McCorkle, a spokeswoman for Yost, said.
Planned Parenthood affiliate Preterm-Cleveland did not immediately respond to a request for comment as the lead plaintiff in the case.
The decision points to the need to secure abortion rights via ballot initiative, said Lauren Blauvelt, executive director of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Ohio.
“Ohioans are reassured that they have a critical safeguard through our courts against anti-abortion lawmakers,” Blauvelt said in a statement.
Impact of Supreme Court Ruling
Ohio’s law went into effect in July 2022 following the U.S. Supreme Court reversing Roe v. Wade, with the Ohio Supreme Court allowing the law to take effect, and soon become a national topic of discussion when a 10-year-old rape victim was required to travel across state lines for an abortion in Indiana in September, as reported by Reuters.
Following The Columbus Dispatch and others who sued to overturn the law, Jenkins blocked it in September 2022 following the plaintiffs’ suit.