Wendy Davis challenges Texas abortion law in court

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Former Texas State Senator Wendy Davis, best known for her 13-hour filibuster on a 2013 abortion bill, has filed a federal lawsuit challenging Texas’ recent abortion law. The lawsuit says the law is “patently unconstitutional” and drafted to “defy the federal courts.”

The law, which took effect in September and allows individuals to bring civil lawsuits against anyone who ‘aids or abets’ an abortion after fetal heart activity is detected, has led abortion clinics to stop operating. suggest the procedure after about six weeks of pregnancy. .

Meanwhile, abortion funds — nonprofit advocacy groups that help pay for abortions and related expenses — have seen increased demand from pregnant Texans seeking out-of-state care. This financial support has put the funds in the crosshairs of abortion opponents, who have claimed on social media and in legal documents that donors, employees and volunteers of the abortion fund are subject to lawsuits. court cases and criminal charges.

Davis, who was the Democratic candidate for governor of Texas in 2014 and unsuccessfully ran for Congress in 2020, is donating and working with the Lilith Fund for Reproductive Equity, an Austin-based abortion fund, according to the trial. She claims in the lawsuit that these threats against donors and volunteers “have had a chilling effect” and prevent her from associating with “like-minded people to express her views and achieve her advocacy goals.”

“As a result, she intends to make no further donations to Texas abortion funds until the Court clarifies this matter,” the lawsuit said.

She is joined in the lawsuit by the Stigma Relief Fund, an abortion fund associated with abortion provider Whole Woman’s Health, and Marva Sadler and Sean Mehl, who both work for Whole Woman’s Health and serve on the board of the Stigma Relief Fund. Sadler and Mehl say in the lawsuit that they have stopped donating to abortion funds “until the Court clarifies whether and to what extent [they] may incur liability for this.”

They are suing state Rep. Briscoe Cain, R-Deer Park and three private citizens who made efforts to sue abortion funds. Cain recently sent cease and desist letters to all abortion funds in Texas, accusing them of criminal conduct.

The lawsuit claims the law violates the plaintiff’s rights to due process and free speech and asks the court to declare unenforceable both that law and the old Texas abortion law.

“We are today asking the courts to end the unconstitutional harassment of abortion funds by confirming that SB8 cannot be used to silence donors with false threats,” Davis said in a statement. “More than that, we’re asking the courts to stop the nightmare SB8 has created for Texans if they need abortion services.”

Legal context

In recent months, abortion opponents have accused abortion funds of civil and criminal improprieties, and abortion funds have filed their own lawsuits to block the law.

The chief architects of Texas’ new abortion law have asked a district judge in the state to allow them to depose the leaders of two abortion funds, seeking to ‘better assess the prospects for legal success’ in potential lawsuits for illegal abortions.

Anti-abortion advocacy groups, including the Thomas More Society, have also tweeted about different abortion funds, saying their donors could face lawsuits. The law clarifies that paying for a prohibited abortion constitutes “complicity” and a person can be prosecuted “regardless of whether the person knew or ought to have known that the abortion would be performed or induced in violation” of the law.

Last month, two abortion funds filed federal lawsuits against anti-abortion advocacy groups that had threatened to sue them.

Recently, Cain claimed that abortion funds could also face criminal charges under a Texas abortion law that was declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1973. Cain claimed in his cease and desist letter that the law, which was never repealed by lawmakers, was recently reaffirmed when the state passed the new abortion law.

Davis’ lawsuit asks the judge to affirm that the old criminal law is unenforceable and the new law is unconstitutional.

The current law “is not only intended to strip Texans of their basic right to make decisions about their pregnancies based on their individual circumstances and religious beliefs, but also to flout the federal courts,” the lawsuit states.

In December, the United States Supreme Court rejected most of the arguments made by abortion providers to challenge the law, and although a state judge found the law unconstitutional, he allowed it. to remain in force.

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