STATEMENT: Supreme Court Dismisses Case Without Making a Decision on Emergency Abortion Care

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the procedural mess it made in Idaho v. United States, during which vulnerable pregnant patients bore the consequences of the politicization of the judiciary. Although emergency abortion care under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) will be permitted in Idaho while the merits of the case are decided by lower courts, pregnant patients and medical providers will continue to be caught in the crosshairs. In response, Sabrina Talukder, director of the Women’s Initiative at the Center for American Progress, issued the following statement:

Pregnant women in dire medical emergencies bore the life-threatening consequences of the Supreme Court’s procedural “miscalculations” during the litigation of Idaho v. United States. And although the Supreme Court’s action today provides some degree of relief that medical providers in Idaho can do their job without fear of criminal sanctions, Justice Samuel Alito’s dissenting opinion reveals how extremist justices remain willing to commandeer the judiciary to effectuate their personal anti-abortion ideologies and politicize medicine.