A week of uncertainty didn’t end up changing much for SB 8.
A Texas law severely restricting abortion access by allowing citizens to sue abortion providers has been reinstated after a two-day pause. On Friday, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued an administrative stay on a previous ruling halting SB 8, which effectively bans abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy, in response to a request by the state of Texas for a temporary stay. That stay blocks a Wednesday injunction by a federal district court in Texas, which briefly halted the law on the grounds that it violated the constitutional right to abortion access. That temporary stay is just the latest development in a September lawsuit filed by the Biden Justice Department against the state of Texas, which argues that SB 8 is unconstitutional. The suit has resulted in a whiplash-inducing back-and-forth by the courts this week, with the status of reproductive health care in Texas hanging in the balance. For now, Friday’s stay has blocked the district court injunction — but it’s still undecided whether it will remain in place in the long term. According to Friday’s court order, the Biden Justice Department has until Tuesday to respond to Texas’s emergency motion to stay the district court’s injunction. The Fifth Circuit panel could then decide to extend the stay. As Vox’s Anna North explained last month, SB 8 has dramatically affected the lives of pregnant people in Texas since it was enacted on September 1, forcing them to carry unwanted pregnancies or leave the state to receive care while potentially incurring significant costs for travel, lodging, and childcare, in addition to lost wages from missed work. Already, according to a PBS NewsHour report, at least 300 Texans seeking abortions have sought care in Oklahoma, putting a strain not only on them but on the resources of the Oklahoma providers and patients, too. On Wednesday, Judge Robert Pitman’s pointed,113-page ruling temporarily brought a halt to SB 8, granting a two-day reprieve to patients seeking abortions and facilities performing them. Pitman’s decision, which describes SB 8 as an “unprecedented and transparent statutory scheme,” offered a clear-cut defense of abortion rights, and for a brief period following Wednesday’s injunction, some abortion providers resumed performing abortions past the six-week mark — albeit with a sense of trepidation, according to the Texas Tribune.
