A Supreme Court opinion mistakenly posted Wednesday showed the justices are poised to allow abortions in medical emergencies in Idaho. That’s according to a copy of the opinion reviewed by Bloomberg, which showed the majority plans to dismiss the appeal with a 6-3 vote — but not address key issues in the case.
The Supreme Court’s elimination of Roe v. Wade resulted in contentious debate as doctors and hospitals grew increasingly nervous about what was legal involving reproductive health. In this case, petitioners asked that the long-standing federal law, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act or EMTALA, continue to stand over state laws that ban abortion at all costs — even in the cases of the life and health of the mother.
The leaked decision shows the justices plan to reinstate a lower court ruling that said Idaho hospitals could continue performing emergency abortions to protect mothers. Justice Elena Kagan reportedly wrote in a concurring opinion that the ruling “will prevent Idaho from enforcing its abortion ban when the termination of a pregnancy is needed to prevent serious harms to a woman’s health.” The Supreme Court’s press office told Bloomberg the opinion had not been officially released.
“The Court’s Publications Unit inadvertently and briefly uploaded a document to the Court’s website,” Patricia McCabe, the court’s public information officer. “The Court’s opinion in Moyle v. United States and Idaho v. United States will be issued in due course.”
ALSO READ: ‘Creepy weirdos’: Senator fears Trump WH staff would destroy government from ‘inside’ Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch were the dissenting opinions, according to the report. In a post by the ACLU, the group has said that overturning Roe “did not diminish these longstanding federal protections, which override state laws that would prohibit such care, but now, extreme politicians are doing everything in their power to prevent someone experiencing emergency pregnancy complications from getting care in emergency rooms.”
The case before the court came out of Idaho, in which the GOP-led legislatures passed legislation that would block all emergency care for pregnant people. The abortion ban in the state allowed no exception for rape, incest or the life and health of the mother. “St. Luke’s Health System, the largest health system in Idaho, which sees hundreds of thousands of emergency department visits each year, reports that they are now transferring pregnant patients with medical emergencies out of state to get the care they need, but even that delay can also increase the unacceptable risks patients face,” the ACLU also pointed out.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote that she would not have dismissed the case, according to Bloomberg. “Today’s decision is not a victory for pregnant patients in Idaho. It is delay,” she wrote. “While this court dawdles and the country waits, pregnant people experiencing emergency medical conditions remain in a precarious position, as their doctors are kept in the dark about what the law requires.”
