May 5
The conservative justice on the U.S. Supreme Court blocked an appeals court order that made the abortion pill mifepristone inaccessible to A
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The conservative justice on the U.S. Supreme Court blocked an appeals court order that made the abortion pill mifepristone inaccessible to A
By Andrew Chung May 14 (Reuters) - The U.S.
By Andrew Chung
Thu, May 14, 2026 at 2:34 PM MST
May 14 (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday allowed the abortion pill to be prescribed through telemedicine and dispensed by mail, restoring for now a 2023 federal rule challenged by Republican-governed Louisiana that had made access to the medication easier.
The justices granted requests by two manufacturers of the abortion pill, called mifepristone, to lift a lower court's block on the rule that was issued by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration during Democratic former President Joe Biden's administration, while the legal challenge plays out.
Conservative Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented from the decision.
The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on May 1 had ordered the imposition of a previous federal rule that required an in-person clinician visit in order to receive mifepristone.
A unanimous Supreme Court preserved access to a medication that was used in nearly two-thirds of abortions in the U.S. last year.
THANK FUCKING GOD
"The Supreme Court on Thursday [June 13, 2024] unanimously preserved access to a medication that was used in nearly two-thirds of all abortions in the U.S. last year, in the court’s first abortion decision since conservative justices overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago.
The nine justices ruled that abortion opponents lacked the legal right to sue over the federal Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the medication, mifepristone, and the FDA’s subsequent actions to ease access to it. The case had threatened to restrict access to mifepristone across the country, including in states where abortion remains legal.
Abortion is banned at all stages of pregnancy in 14 states, and after about six weeks of pregnancy in three others, often before women realize they’re pregnant.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was part of the majority to overturn Roe, wrote for the court on Thursday that “federal courts are the wrong forum for addressing the plaintiffs’ concerns about FDA’s actions.”
The opinion underscored the stakes of the 2024 election and the possibility that an FDA commissioner appointed by Republican Donald Trump, if he wins the White House, could consider tightening access to mifepristone, including prohibiting sending it through the mail...
Kavanaugh’s opinion managed to unite a court deeply divided over abortion and many other divisive social issues by employing a minimalist approach that focused solely on the technical legal issue of standing and reached no judgment about the FDA’s actions...
While praising the decision, President Joe Biden signaled Democrats will continue to campaign heavily on abortion ahead of the November elections. “It does not change the fact that the right for a woman to get the treatment she needs is imperiled if not impossible in many states,” Biden said in a statement...
About two-thirds of U.S. adults oppose banning the use of mifepristone, or medication abortion, nationwide, according to a KFF poll conducted in February. About one-third would support a nationwide ban...
More than 6 million people [in the U.S.] have used mifepristone since 2000. Mifepristone blocks the hormone progesterone and primes the uterus to respond to the contraction-causing effect of a second drug, misoprostol. The two-drug regimen has been used to end a pregnancy through 10 weeks gestation...
Biden’s administration and drug manufacturers had warned that siding with abortion opponents in this case could [have] undermined the FDA’s drug approval process beyond the abortion context by inviting judges to second-guess the agency’s scientific judgments. The Democratic administration and New York-based Danco Laboratories, which makes mifepristone, argued that the drug is among the safest the FDA has ever approved."
-via AP, June 13, 2024
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Note: A massive relief and a genuine victory - this will preserve access to the medication used in 2/3rds of abortions last year, for at least another 2 years. (Probably minimum time it will take Republicans to get their next attempt before the Supreme Court.)
Still, with this, a sword that has been hanging over our heads for the last two years is gone. There will be a new one soon, but we just bought ourselves probably at least 2 years. The fight isn't over, but this is absolutely worth celebrating.
Finally, some good news.
👉🏿 https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/16/health/abortion-pills-fda.html
A federal appeals court has restricted access to one of the most common means of abortion in the U.S. by blocking the mailing of mifepriston
This administration has already shown that it will ignore scientific evidence to advance its own narratives.
3.19.26
Jessica Valenti and Kylie Cheung at Abortion, Every Day:
Republicans Introduce National “Catch Kit” Bill
U.S. House Republicans have introduced legislation that would make it illegal for women to flush their miscarriage or abortion remains when using mifepristone. The Clean Water for All Life Act, introduced by Rep. Mary Miller of Illinois, would instead require women to use “catch kits” when their pregnancy is ending—forcing them to bag up that tissue and blood and bring it back to the doctor as medical waste. Mary. No. ✋(·•᷄ࡇ•᷅ ) Rep. Miller insists that her legislation will “protect both human dignity and America’s water systems,” but regular readers know what’s happening here. For years, Abortion, Every Day has been tracking other ‘catch kit’ bills—like this one that we flagged in Wisconsin last year—along with state legislation that would test the groundwater for abortion pills and hormones associated with birth control and gender-affirming care. The short version is that anti-abortion activists claim that abortion medication, hormones—and even pregnancy remains—are polluting our water supply. I mean, who could forget the “we’re all drinking other people’s abortions” lady?
And while Politico reports that Miller’s legislation is the “first federal bill” that weaponizes environmental laws to attack abortion rights, that’s actually not true. AED discovered a similar piece of federal legislation last summer: the “Respectful Treatment of Unborn Remains Act,” which would have punished abortion providers with five years in prison for disposing of fetal remains “in publicly owned water systems.” In fact, our friend Mary sponsored that legislation, as well! Here’s the thing: for as long as we’ve been reporting on these bills, the response has been almost universal: this will never happen. We’ve been assured over and over again that these bills are too extreme and ridiculous to ever go anywhere.
Anti-abortion extremist Rep. Mary Miller (R-IL)’s proposed Clean Water for All Life Act is an extreme attack on the availability of medication abortion (aka mifepristone), all in the name of promoting anti-abortion pseudoscience about wastewater.