TEXAS, USA — Amarillo U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk has granted a motion allowing Idaho, Missouri and Kansas to intervene in a lawsuit originally filed in November 2022 against the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) by anti-abortion group Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine. The ruling came down on Friday, Jan. 12, 2023.
The FDA had argued, among other things, that the states had waited too long to try and be a part of the suit. However, the judge disagreed in the order, stating the states could argue their interests in the lawsuit. Judge Kacsmaryk, appointed by President Trump, previously suspended the use of the drug in what was called an unprecedented legal move in April of 2023.
One of the arguments in the motion to intervene is new data showing people are traveling out-of-state to get, or ordering by mail, chemical abortion pills called Mifepristone (Mifeprex). They argue the drug is unsafe and it leads to hospitals having to shell out more money to deal with these complications.
The drug Mifeprex was approved in generic form by the FDA in April 2019, and the administration approved the drug in its name-brand in September 2020. The administration states on its website that the drug is safe when used correctly.
"The FDA approved Mifeprex more than 20 years ago based on a thorough and comprehensive review of the scientific evidence presented and determined that it was safe and effective for its indicated use," the FDA's website states.
In the motion to intervene, it argues the FDA has failed the American people by not "rejecting or limiting the use of drugs dangerous to the public." Further, that the department was failing women and girls.
The judge's decision to grant the motion, also filed on Friday, said that the states motion, "raises a significant amount of allegations," against the FDA and regarding alleged unlawfulness, that could "affect their interests" and the court found the arguments sufficient. The court specifically agreed with one of the three states arguments that the case does affect them because it affects their economic and sovereign interests.
The judge furthered that even if he was mistaken in his analyses and the states were not entitled to intervene, the court can still allow them to intervene based on precedents that states courts can allow intervention, when "the application is timely, there is a common question of law or fact and there will be no undue delay or prejudice to the original parties."
Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai'i, Indiana, and Kentucky issued a statement on the ruling, calling it a "seemingly innocuous legal move" that actually will give more credibility to an argument, that they call, "based on hypothesis." The organization furthered it will open the door for the Supreme Court to undertake baseless arguments.
"It's no coincidence that you are seeing Idaho in front of the Supreme Court time and time again," said CEO of Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai'i, Indiana, Kentucky, Rebecca Gibron. "They are consistently at the forefront of the battle against reproductive rights that their own state doesn't support, and is actively being harmed by, with some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country. Lawmakers here are doing everything in their power to take us backward and ignore decades of proof that Mifepristone is a safe and effective option. For the sake of patients everywhere, we hope the court will see through this embarrassing attempt to grasp at legal straws."
Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador's Office told KTVB he was very pleased that the court in Texas recognized Idaho's standing in the case.
"We intervened over concerns for the safety of Idaho women and the virtually unregulated access to mail-order abortion pills. The Federal Drug Administration’s recklessness puts the lives of both pregnant women and their unborn children in medical jeopardy,” Labrador stated.
The original lawsuit was filed by the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians & Gynecologists, the American College of Pediatricians, Christian Medical and Dental Associations and four doctors. It states that the drug, Mifepristone, was not properly approved by the FDA and the drug should be taken off the market to protect women's health.
The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, originally named the Alliance Defense Fund, is headquartered in Amarillo, Texas, and is designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). The center states the alliance has continually fought to minimize LGBTQ+ and abortion rights.
"[The Alliance] is attempting to eradicate the separation of church and state and graft its version of conservative Christianity onto the legal profession and the culture at large through its legal strategies, the training of thousands of attorneys and its advocacy of policy changes at the state and federal levels," the SPLC website states.
The American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists is an organization of pro-life obstetricians and gynecologists, and the American College of Pediatricians is conservative pediatrician advocacy group and is also designated a hate group by the SPLC, calling it a fringe hate group that, "masquerades as the premier U.S. association of pediatricians to push anti-LGBTQ junk science, primarily via far-right conservative media and filing amicus briefs in cases related to gay adoption and marriage equality."
The Supreme Court decided to hear the case in December 2023 and a decision is expected in the summer of 2024.
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