By: Ayana Byrd
Two of the state’s most prominent anti-abortion organizations, Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Right to Life, have not put their support behind HB 1500 due to what The Texas Observer characterizes as its “its glaring constitutional problems.”
By: Michael Gryboski
Paul Linton, an attorney who formerly served as general counsel for Americans United for Life, told CP that he found the Alabama and West Virginia amendment vote results “very encouraging.”
“Other states will likely consider similar measures, particularly Iowa, where a one-sentence neutrality amendment has already been introduced, and Kansas, in the event the state supreme court recognizes a right to abortion,” Linton said.
When asked how effective pro-life state amendments could be in banning abortion, Linton responded that he believed it “would depend upon the precise language of the amendment.”
“I do not think that state constitutional amendments are typically used to define and punish criminal conduct, which is more a matter for the legislatures to decide,” he explained.
“On the other hand, a strong statement of pro-life principle in a state constitution may act as a restraint on a legislature enacting a ‘liberalized’ abortion law.”
Linton referenced “neutrality amendments” as an example, which state that the constitution does not protect the right to an abortion, noting that they “would enable states to enforce pre-Roe laws prohibiting abortions” or possibly “to enact new laws prohibiting abortion.”
By: Vicky Camarillo
But anti-abortion groups Texas Alliance for Life and the more hardline Texas Right to Life aren’t throwing their full support behind HB 1500. Joe Pojman, director of Texas Alliance for Life, said while he’s excited about the number of lawmakers signing on, his group is not recommending that the Legislature pass it. “We’re just recommending bills that have a reasonable chance of sustaining a federal court challenge,” Pojman said.
By: Mary Tuma
But the bill is so extreme – and plainly illegal – it’s failing to curry favor with anti-choice groups. Texas Alliance for Life, one of the state’s leading anti-abortion organizations, tells the Chronicle it does not support the bill for a few reasons, including the fact it wouldn’t withstand a federal court challenge and it asks the the Attorney General to ignore the Supreme Court. “We could no sooner ignore SCOTUS than the force of gravity,” says TAL’s Joe Pojman. His group also isn’t getting behind the bill because it criminalizes women who undergo abortion, says Pojman.
By: Brianna Stone
It would take five Supreme Court votes to overturn the ruling. Kavanaugh could be the fifth, though Texas Alliance for Life director Joe Pojman said he doesn’t believe Roe will be overturned.
“But there is a good chance, if other questions came before the Supreme Court, Kavanaugh could help us prevail on issues we have not in the past,” Pojman said.
In 2016, the Supreme Court struck down a Texas law that would require abortion clinics to meet surgical-center standards and require doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.
Senate Bill 8, the major abortion bill of last year’s legislative session, is still being challenged in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The law would require fetal remains from abortions and miscarriages to be cremated or buried and outlaw a common second-trimester procedure, dilation and evacuation, which abortion opponents refer to as as “dismemberment” abortion.
Pojman said he believes Kavanaugh could help uphold these laws if they come before the Supreme Court.
“We don’t expect Roe to be overturned anytime soon, but we hope that sometime in the future the precedent will change to protect unborn children,” Pojman said.
By: Mary Tuma
But TAL’s second priority, says its founder and leader Joe Pojman, is to prohibit “wrongful birth” lawsuits against physicians who withhold information from patients about fetal anomalies, another bill that didn’t pass last session. “These suits send the wrong message by saying society thinks a child born with a disability has less value than a child who is healthy,” says Pojman.
The discord between the two groups stems from TRL’s ties to well-funded conservative group Empower Texans, and from the group’s aggressive penchant for anti-choice bills that are sure to face legal challenges (“Deep Divisions in Texas’ Powerful Anti-Choice Movement,” April 6). Unlike TRL, Alliance for Life adopts a “prudent” approach to bills; for instance, it cautions against adopting bans at less than 20 weeks and is pessimistic about the 5th Circuit upholding the 2017 D&E ban. “Those laws do very poorly in federal court; there’s precedent against the law that’s strongly against us,” says Pojman.