Judge extends order allowing abortion clinics to stay open amid legal battle over La. trigger laws

[Hoodat]

Judge extends order allowing abortion clinics to stay open amid legal battle over La. trigger laws

AP  |  July 19, 2022  |  1:35 PM

With access to abortion flickering in Louisiana, the legal battle over the statewide ban continued in court Monday morning.

The hearing at the 19th Judicial District Court in Baton Rouge ended with no decision after about an hour, drawing out the process for at least another day as both sides submit additional materials to Judge Don Johnson. A temporary restraining order will stay in effect pending further proceedings, allowing abortion clinics to stay open for the time being.

Judge Johnson formally extended the temporary restraining order on Tuesday, allowing clinics to stay open. The order will expire after 10 days or when the court makes a ruling in the case.

Louisiana’s anti-abortion law has “trigger language” that was designed to make it effective immediately after the Supreme Court overturned the key 1973 Roe v Wade decision  .  .  .

.  .  .  In the latest legal development, State District Judge Donald Johnson issued a temporary order last week blocking enforcement pending the hearing in a lawsuit that claims the state law is unconstitutionally vague. Attorneys for a north Louisiana abortion clinic and other supporters of legal abortion want Johnson to keep blocking enforcement as their lawsuit plays out.

“The courts are an extremely important avenue for this fight,” Joanna Wright, an attorney for the north Louisiana clinic that is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit, said last week. “I think that this is a national moment and a national dialogue and the courts are one way that we are having that dialogue.”  .  .

https://www.wbrz.com/news/judge-extends-order-allowing-abortion-clinics-to-stay-open-amid-legal-battle-over-la-trigger-laws

[Hoodat]

The abortionists are putting up the argument here and elsewhere (e.g. West Virginia) that the current laws are conflicting in that one law 'allows' abortion while another bans it.  However, their premise is untrue in that the law 'allowing' abortion does not limit government's action to ban it.  AG Landry makes a good argument:

Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry’s office argued that the state ban is constitutional and should no longer be blocked.
.  .  .
Landry, in a filing last week, argued that the law “needs only to delineate what is illegal — not define what is legal.”

“The rule of law must be followed, and I will not rest until it is,” Landry recently tweeted.