Court rules that Texas can ban emergency abortions despite federal guidelines
Emergency room doctors in Texas are not required to perform emergency abortions, despite federal guidelines requiring hospitals to provide stabilizing care, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld a ruling that sided with the state of Texas, which had sued the Biden administration, arguing that the 2022 federal guidelines were an overreach that would “force abortions.”
The appeal was heard by Judge Leslie H. Southwick, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, and Judges Kurt Engelhardt and Cory Wilson, who were appointed by President Donald Trump.
Judge Engelhardt wrote that the federal guidelines do not require doctors to perform emergency abortions, adding that the guidelines “do not prescribe any specific form of medical treatment, let alone abortion.”
The Justice Department and the Texas attorney general’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday evening.
Tuesday’s ruling is the latest development in a long-running legal battle between the Biden administration and the state of Texas following the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to Overturning Roe v. Wadeand it comes amid a slew of other lawsuits over whether exceptions can be made for abortions in states like Texas, where it is banned.
The ruling also came less than a month after the Texas Supreme Court ruled against a woman who sought a court-approved abortion because her fetus had been diagnosed with a fatal condition. The woman, Kate Cox, ultimately left Texas to have an abortion, and the ruling against her left many doctors in the state unclear as to which cases would legally qualify for an abortion.
After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services decided issued guidance in July 2022 which has instructed hospitals that federal law requires doctors to perform abortions even in states where it is prohibited, if they believe this is “the stabilizing treatment necessary” to protect the mother’s health in a medical emergency.
The federal guidelines strengthened the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act of 1986, or EMTALA, which requires emergency rooms to provide stabilizing care regardless of a patient’s ability to pay.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton responded by suing the Biden administration over the guidelines. Mr. Paxton wrote in a complaint filed in July 2022 that President Biden “blatantly ignored the legislative and democratic process — and ignored the Supreme Court’s ruling before the ink is dry — by directing his appointed bureaucrats to require hospitals and emergency medicine physicians must perform abortions.”
Judge Engelhardt wrote in the ruling on Tuesday that “EMTALA does not provide pregnant mothers with an unconditional right to abort her child, especially when EMTALA imposes equal stabilization obligations.”
“We therefore decline to expand the scope of EMTALA,” Judge Engelhardt wrote.