26 Mar Battle Born Progress calls on Supreme Court to preserve access to mifepristone
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 26, 2024
Contact: Jacob Solis, jacob@battlebornprogress.org, 702.468.9486
Battle Born Progress calls on Supreme Court to preserve access to mifepristone
LAS VEGAS, NV – Today, the U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, the case that will decide whether right-wing activists and Trump-appointed judges will be able to abuse the courts to ban mifepristone – a safe and effective medication used in more than half of all abortions nationwide.
In April 2023, Trump-appointed District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk – a former lawyer with deep and documented ties to the Christian right – invalidated the FDA approval for mifepristone. He did so based on spurious evidence and arguments so thin that even the conservative Fifth Circuit Court stopped his would-be ban.
Nevertheless, the Fifth Circuit’s decision would still block access to mifepristone for months and cut availability from 10 weeks of pregnancy to seven, all based on legal interpretations that have nothing to do with science or medicine and everything to do with the anti-choice activists who want to ban mifepristone outright.
The Supreme Court was right to temporarily block Kacsmaryk’s decision last year while this case worked through the courts. Now, it must make that block permanent and uphold access to a drug that more than two decades of use has proven to be safe and effective.
Shelbie Swartz, Executive Director of Battle Born Progress, issued the following statement:
“The reality is that we know mifepristone is a safe and effective drug, and it’s obvious that this legal attack on abortion access has no merit whatsoever. But we can’t forget that this is the same Supreme Court that overturned Roe, and it’s still controlled by the same kind of conservatives that have already enacted strict and unpopular abortion bans across the country. A ban on mifepristone would be a functional ban on abortion for millions of Americans nationwide – even though it’s safer than taking Tylenol. Anything less than the Supreme Court rejecting this half-baked attack on reproductive autonomy would be unconscionable.”
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