Republican attorneys general from Louisiana, Alabama, and Arkansas filed a motion on Sept. 30 asking the nation’s highest court to stop what they call a coordinated effort by blue states to nullify pro-life laws across state lines. The filing targets so-called “shield laws” enacted by California, Massachusetts, and New York that protect doctors from prosecution when they prescribe abortion drugs to women in states where those drugs are banned.
“These shield laws have nothing to do with ensuring the availability of abortion within the borders of New York, Massachusetts, and California,” the attorneys general argued in their motion. “They exist only to perpetuate abortions outside of those borders.”
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin, and Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall are leading the charge. They’re asking the Supreme Court to examine the case under the Constitution’s full faith and credit clause and the equal sovereignty doctrine.
New York Attorney General Letitia James fired back on social media, vowing to “fight with everything in my power to defend our shield law and protect every provider and patient.”
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The motion argues that California, New York, and Massachusetts have “undermined” the Supreme Court’s historic Dobbs v. Jackson decision, which returned abortion policy to the states. According to the filing, these blue states have “claimed the right to make abortion policy, their abortion policy, for the entire Nation by overriding democratically enacted laws in pro-life states.”
“Dobbs is no more than a parchment promise if shield-law states can defy this Court by unilaterally decreeing that abortions must flourish in pro-life states,” the motion states.
The FDA has claimed it cannot act until it completes a mifepristone review, though the attorneys general note no review is actually required for the agency to reinstate common-sense safeguards. Those protections, including an in-person doctor visit requirement, were stripped during the Biden administration. Congress has also failed to address the issue despite direct appeals from state attorneys general.
The same three states filed a separate lawsuit on Sept. 30 in the Western District of Louisiana naming 30 individuals and organizations allegedly involved in “a sweeping, coordinated scheme” to illegally prescribe and mail abortion drugs into pro-life states. The filing indicates these actors acknowledge their conduct is illegal, with some doing business only in states where their actions violate the law.
Both California and New York have specifically refused Louisiana’s extradition requests for out-of-state doctors who prescribed mifepristone to residents of the Pelican State.
The case now sits before the Supreme Court, where the justices will decide whether the constitutional order established by Dobbs can survive open defiance from states determined to export their abortion policies nationwide.
This article originally appeared on American Faith and is reposted with permission.
