Missouri abortion rights in legal limbo after constitutional protections take effect
The day after Missouri voters supported the measure to amend the constitution, Planned Parenthood affiliates in the state filed a lawsuit asking the court to strike down the state’s near-total abortion ban as well as a raft of other restrictions that, Planned Parenthood said, make it impossible to perform the procedure. In a hearing on Wednesday, the groups asked the Jackson county circuit judge Jerri Zhang to quickly issue an order to freeze the restrictions and allow abortions in the state to resume on Friday.
Read more at The Guardian
Missouri Voters Enshrined Abortion Rights. GOP Lawmakers Are Already Working to Roll Them Back.
One measure would ask voters to amend the state constitution to define life as beginning at conception, declaring that embryos are people with rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
The result would be to classify abortion as an unlawful killing.
Another proposal, aimed at repealing the abortion rights amendment, would ask voters to ban gender transition procedures for minors, tying the two issues together, despite the fact that the amendment did not address gender surgery and gender-affirming care for transgender children is already illegal in Missouri.
Other proposed amendments include stricter abortion limits, such as restricting access to cases of rape, incest, medical emergencies and fetal anomalies. These measures would impose additional requirements, such as mandating that rape survivors file police reports to obtain an abortion.
Read more at ProPublica and Talking Points Memo