A lawsuit that aims to restrict nationwide access to abortion pills can proceed, a federal judge in Texas ruled on Thursday, months after the US supreme court rebuked an earlier version of the lawsuit over a legal technicality.
The US judge Matthew Kacsmaryk is allowing the attorneys general of Idaho, Kansas and Missouri to continue a case that takes aim at the FDA’s regulation of mifepristone, a drug typically used in medication abortions. Joe Biden’s Department of Justice had asked for the case to be dismissed, arguing that the attorneys general had no real link to Kacsmaryk’s court in the northern district of Texas.
Kacsmaryk, a Donald Trump appointee, said in his ruling that it was too early in litigation to make that call.
“Venue remains disputed here,” he wrote, “and should be properly dealt with at a phase where each party may fully argue the issue”.
The case could have sweeping implications for the availability of abortion across the country, as medication abortions account for more than two-thirds of all US abortions.
The original version of the case, which was brought by a group of anti-abortion activists, sought to roll back the FDA’s 2000 approval of mifepristone – a request Kacsmaryk granted but was later paused by an appeals court. In later litigation, the activists asked courts to reverse more recent FDA rule-making around mifepristone, such as a policy that permits providers to dispense the drug through telehealth.
Last year, the US supreme court ruled that the anti-abortion activists behind the case lacked the necessary standing to sue. Although the activists dismissed their case, Idaho, Kansas and Missouri attorneys general filed a 199-page complaint arguing for their right to take up the case in the activists’ stead.
“This outrageous case should have been put to bed,” Julia Kaye, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project, said in a statement. “Instead, the same Texas judge who already tried to take mifepristone off the market nationwide has left the door open for extremist politicians to continue attacking medication abortion in his courtroom.”
It is not yet clear whether Trump’s Department of Justice will continue to defend the FDA’s current regulation of mifepristone. Project 2025, the famous conservative playbook, urged the FDA to roll back its approval of mifepristone on its own.
