SCOTUS moves in deliberations over the Texas Pro-Life Omnibus Bill of 2013

The Supreme Court of the United States announced that oral arguments for and against Texas’s Pro-Life Omnibus Bill of 2013, House Bill 2, will be heard on March 2.  The announcement comes after SCOTUS agreed to take up a case against HB 2 filed by a national coalition of abortion zealots in 2015. 

Efforts by Big Abortion to undercut and overturn HB 2 at a state level failed.  As the March 2 hearing approaches, abortion supporters are so desperate to vilify the life-affirming provisions of House Bill 2 that they have begun peddling fiction to sell their bias.  In late 2015, for example, we saw the release of a now-thoroughly-discredited “study” claiming – based on zero evidence – that House Bill 2 has led to an uptick in self-induced abortions among Texas women.  In fact, the reported abortion rate has declined since the passage of HB 2, and there is no credible evidence whatsoever of the bill creating a dangerous or adverse environment for Texas women.

Arguments that House Bill 2 poses a so-called “undue burden” on pregnant women (because many abortion mills will choose to close once all provisions are enforced) have been predicated on weak and contradictory evidence, and judges have denounced the abortion industry’s floundering arguments on numerous occasions.  For example, Judge Edith Jones of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals noted that at least 210 women are hospitalized annually following abortions in Texas – a fact to which Planned Parenthood conceded – suggesting that Planned Parenthood has little room to argue against the health and safety provisions established in House Bill 2.  A dearth of evidence of unconstitutionality prompted the use of blatant falsehoods intended to garner sympathy for the nonexistent plight created by the Pro-Life law.  In fact, House Bill 2 threatens nothing but the bottom line of Texas abortion mills.

SCOTUS has thus far received briefs from the opposition – the abortion chain Whole Women’s Health, as well as 45 other anti-Life groups from around the country – which were submitted in early January.  Texas Right to Life will file an amicus brief with the Court in early February, and will be present before the Supreme Court during the arguments on March 2.  SCOTUS is expected to release a final ruling on House Bill 2’s constitutionality this summer.