AUSTIN, Texas – A Texas judge on Thursday gave a pregnant woman whose fetus has a fatal diagnosis permission to have an abortion in an unprecedented challenge to bans that more than a dozen states have enacted since Roe v. was overturned. . Wade.
The lawsuit by Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother of two from the Dallas area, is believed to be the first time since last year’s landmark Supreme Court decision that a woman anywhere in the country has asked a court to approve an immediate decision. abortion.
It was unclear how quickly or if Cox would receive the procedure.
State District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble, an elected Democrat, said she would grant a temporary restraining order allowing Cox to obtain an abortion under what are narrow exceptions to the Texas ban.
That decision is likely to be appealed by the state, which argued that Cox does not meet the criteria for a medical exception.
In a brief hearing Thursday, her attorneys told Gamble that Cox, who is 20 weeks pregnant, went to an emergency room this week for the fourth time during her pregnancy.
Cox and her husband attended the hearing via Zoom but did not address the court.
A Texas judge allowed Kate Cox, a Dallas mother, to undergo an abortion due to pregnancy complications. Kate Cox/AFP via Getty Images
Doctors have told Cox that if the baby’s heartbeat stopped, inducing labor would carry a risk of uterine rupture due to her previous C-sections and that another C-section at term would jeopardize her ability to have another child.
“The idea that Ms. Cox desperately wants to be a mother and that this law could cause her to lose that ability is shocking and would be a true miscarriage of justice,” Gamble said.
The Center for Reproductive Rights, which represents Cox, has said this lawsuit is believed to be the first of its kind since Roe v. Wade was overturned. Wade.
Since that landmark ruling, Texas and 12 other states have rushed to ban abortion at nearly all stages of pregnancy.
The Texas Attorney General’s office is expected to appeal state District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble’s decision. Photo by SUZANNE CORDEIRO/AFP via Getty Images
Opponents have tried to weaken those bans, including an ongoing challenge in Texas over whether the state law is too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications.
“I do not want to continue the pain and suffering that has plagued this pregnancy or continue to put my body or mental health at the risks of continuing this pregnancy,” Cox wrote in an editorial published in The Dallas Morning News. “I don’t want my baby to come into this world only to see her suffer.”
Although Texas allows exceptions to the ban, doctors and women have argued that the requirements are so vaguely worded that doctors still won’t risk performing abortions, for fear of facing possible criminal charges or lawsuits.
State officials had asked Gamble to deny the request, arguing that Cox has not shown that his life is in imminent danger and therefore cannot qualify for an exception to the ban.
“No facts have been presented to demonstrate that Ms. Cox is at any greater risk, much less life-threatening, than the countless women who give birth every day with similar medical histories,” the state wrote in court documents before Thursday’s hearing. .
Spokespeople for Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton did not immediately respond to messages about whether the state will appeal. Cox’s lawyers have argued that the risks to her health will worsen unless the courts act quickly.
The decision came just two days after Cox filed the lawsuit, which says doctors told her the baby would likely be stillborn or live a week at most.
Cox had C-sections in her previous pregnancies. She found out she was pregnant for the third time in August and weeks later was told her baby was at high risk for a condition known as trisomy 18, which has a very high chance of miscarriage or stillbirth and low survival rates. according to demand. .
The lawsuit was filed a week after the Texas Supreme Court heard arguments about whether the ban is too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications.
That case is one of the biggest current challenges to abortion bans in the United States, although the all-Republican court’s ruling may not come for months.
Texas passed a ban on abortion in most cases after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. AP Photo/Eric Gay, File
In July, several Texas women gave emotional testimony about having babies they knew would not survive and about doctors who could not offer abortions despite their spiraling conditions.
A judge later ruled that Texas’ ban was too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications, but that decision was quickly put on hold after the state appealed.
More than 40 women have had abortions in Texas since the ban went into effect, according to state health figures, none of which have led to criminal charges.
There were more than 16,000 abortions in Texas in the five months before the ban went into effect last year.
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