The Biden administration appealed a federal district court ruling on Friday that declared the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program illegal and blocked new applicants from receiving the program’s benefits. The appeal challenges a ruling made by Texas federal district Judge Andrew Hanen in July. Judge Hanen ruled that DACA was unlawful because it […]
Department of Justice Sues Texas Over Law that Effectively Bans All Abortion
On Thursday, the Justice Department filed a lawsuit against Texas to challenge the state’s new law, SB 8, which prohibits abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, effectively banning all abortion in the state. “The Act is clearly unconstitutional under longstanding Supreme Court precedent,” said Attorney General Merrick Garland in a statement. “The United States has […]
Mexico Supreme Court Rules to Decriminalize Abortion
Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled that the criminalization of abortion is unconstitutional in a unanimous vote Tuesday. This decision sets a precedent to decriminalize abortion throughout the country, which has the second-largest Catholic population in the world. At question was a law in the northern state of Coahuila which stated people who had an abortion, or […]
Texas Judge Temporarily Blocks Anti-Choice Group from Suing Planned Parenthood
On Friday, a U.S. district judge in Texas granted Planned Parenthood’s request for a restraining order against Texas Right to Life, an anti-abortion group in Texas. The group is temporarily blocked from suing Planned Parenthood under Texas’s newly enacted six-week abortion ban, called S.B. 8. Judge Maya Guerra Gamble of the District Court for Travis […]
Supreme Court Ruling Upholds Texas Abortion Ban
On Wednesday night, the Supreme Court denied abortion providers’ request to block the Texas six-week abortion ban. The Texas law, which effectively eliminates all abortion in the state, went into effect yesterday after the Supreme Court failed to make a ruling on abortion providers’ emergency request to block the law. In a 5-4 vote last […]
Texas Catastrophic Abortion Ban Goes into Effect: Supreme Court Refuses to Act
Texas’s six-week abortion ban went into effect today after the Supreme Court failed to act on abortion providers’ emergency filing to block the law. The ban essentially ends abortion access in Texas, the second-largest state in the country. The ban, which is the strictest in the country, prohibits abortions from being performed after six weeks […]
Appeals Court Cancels Hearing for Texas Law That Will Ban Most Abortions
A Texas law that would effectively ban all abortions is set to take effect on Wednesday after an appeals court canceled a hearing Friday designed to challenge the law. The U.S. 5th Circuit Court Appeals was scheduled to have a hearing today to determine the constitutionality of the Texas abortion ban, SB 8. The […]
Supreme Court Blocks Biden Administration’s Eviction Moratorium
The Supreme Court threw out the most recent moratorium on evictions Thursday despite rising cases of the Delta variant, putting hundreds of thousands of people at risk of being evicted from their homes. In an eight-page opinion, the court wrote that in order for the eviction moratorium to continue, Congress would need to pass legislation […]
Supreme Court Denies Biden Administration’s Request to Pause Reimplementation of “Remain in Mexico” Policy
The Supreme Court ordered the Biden administration Tuesday to reimplement former President Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” policy that requires migrants to wait in Mexico until their immigration hearing in the United States. Earlier this month, a federal judge in Texas ordered the Biden administration to revive the policy, which had been formally ended by the […]
Appeals Court Upholds Texas Ban on Common Second-Trimester Abortion Procedure
A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that Texas can ban the standard dilation and evacuation abortion procedure used in the second trimester of pregnancy. Texas will be the first state in the country to ban the procedure. The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a Texas law passed in 2017 banning D&E abortions could […]
Texas Federal Judge Orders Biden to Reimplement Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” Migrant Policy
A federal judge in Texas ruled Friday that the Biden administration must reimplement former President Trump’s border policy that requires migrants to wait in Mexico until their immigration hearing in the United States. The Migrant Protection Protocols policy, or “remain in Mexico,” forces migrants, many of whom are not originally from Mexico, to stay in […]
Federal Judge Blocks Several Indiana Abortion Restrictions
On Tuesday, a federal judge issued permanent injunctions against several Indiana laws that restrict abortion access, ruling them unconstitutional. Judge Sarah Evans Barker of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana blocked a number of Indiana abortion laws that had been challenged in court by a 2018 lawsuit brought by Whole Women’s […]
U.S. Court of Appeals Upholds Tennessee’s 48-hour Abortion Waiting Period
On Thursday, the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a Tennessee law that requires people seeking an abortion to observe a 48-hour waiting period between their first visit to a clinic and when they can obtain an abortion. The federal appeals court’s decision overturns a ruling from a lower court, which declared the law […]
Human Rights Campaign Sues Tennessee over Anti-Transgender “Bathroom Bill”
The Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ civil rights organization, filed a lawsuit Tuesday to challenge Tennessee’s latest anti-transgender law. The “bathroom bill” prevents trans students from using the bathroom that corresponds to their gender identity. The law was signed in May by Tennessee governor Bill Lee and went into effect July 1. It requires that […]
U.S. Court of Appeals Rules Against Web Designer Seeking License to Discriminate Against LGBTQ+ Couples
On Monday, the Tenth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals maintained a lower court’s decision to reject a Colorado web designer’s request to discriminate against LGBTQ+ couples. Lorie Smith, the owner of the web design business 303 Creative LLC, challenged the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act (CADA) by suing to request that her business be allowed to deny […]
Anti-Trans Laws in Arkansas and West Virginia Blocked by Federal Judges
On Wednesday, federal judges blocked two anti-trans state laws from going into effect. The first, an Arkansas law, would prohibit physicians from providing gender-affirming care to transgender youth. The second, a West Virginia law, banned transgender girls and women from playing in women’s public-school sports. The Arkansas law would ban doctors from offering necessary gender-confirming […]
Federal Judge Blocks Arkansas Law Banning Almost All Abortions
On Tuesday, a federal judge placed a preliminary injunction on an Arkansas law that would ban most abortions. The temporary block ensures that the law will not go into effect until a final ruling on the legality of the ban is made. U.S. District Court Judge Kristine Baker blocked the law, which would prohibit all […]
Indiana “Abortion Reversal” Law Blocked by Federal Judge
A federal judge blocked an Indiana abortion law from going into effect that would have required abortion providers to give misinformation to patients seeking a medication abortion. The law said doctors were obligated to tell their patients about the possibility of “abortion reversal”—a contested process for potentially stopping an abortion that has no scientific backing. […]
Federal District Judge Rules DACA Illegal and Blocks New Applications
Judge Andrew Hanen, a federal district judge in Texas, ruled that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was unlawful on Friday. While the decision will not immediately affect current DACA recipients, it will temporarily prevent new applicants from being admitted to the program. Former President Obama created the DACA program in 2012 by executive […]
Supreme Court Maintains Arizona Voting Restrictions Further Weakening Voting Rights Act
On Thursday, the Supreme Court ruled that two Arizona voting restrictions did not violate the Voting Rights Act, the landmark legislation that bans racially discriminatory voting rules. The 6-3 decision was made along ideological lines, with the court’s conservative members comprising the majority and the liberal justices in dissent. Their ruling upholds two voting laws […]
