BY CARRIE N. BAKER | On Friday, April 7, federal judges in both Texas and Washington state issued contradictory rulings on the abortion pill mifepristone.
- Federal judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the Northern District of Texas ruled that the FDA improperly approved mifepristone andsaid he would void the approval on April 14.
- One hour later, fellow federal judge Thomas O. Rice in the Eastern District of Washington issued an injunction blocking the FDA from “altering the status quo and rights as it relates to the availability of mifepristone.”
The FDA is now under contradictory federal court orders regarding its approval of mifepristone—with one court saying the FDA approval of mifepristone is invalid, and another saying it must maintain its approval of mifepristone.
“FDA is under one order that says you can do nothing, and another that says in seven days I’m going to require you to vacate the approval of mifepristone,” Glenn Cohen of Harvard Law School told the Associated Press.
The Texas court also ruled that mailing abortion pills is a crime in violation of the 1873 Comstock Act, which prohibited sending obscene materials through the U.S. mail.
The Department of Justice immediately appealed Kacsmaryk’s ruling. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the DOJ “strongly disagrees with the decision. … [which] overturns the FDA’s expert judgment, rendered over two decades ago, that mifepristone is safe and effective. The department will continue to defend the FDA’s decision.”
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