North Dakota Court Declines to Amend Abortion Law to Clarify Exceptions on Preliminary Injunction Motion
- February 02, 2024
The North Dakota District Court refused January 22 to issue a preliminary injunction to plaintiff abortion providers clarifying exceptions to the state’s anti-abortion law, finding such a request inappropriate for a preliminary injunction.
“Injunctive relief is meant to maintain the status quo prior to a decision on the merits, not to re-word the law,” the court said.
After the state supreme court enjoined North Dakota’s abortion ban law, the North Dakota Legislature amended the state’s abortion statutes by enacting Senate Bill 2150, which would make it a felony to provide abortion care, subject to certain enumerated exceptions.
Specifically, the statute provides an exception for "[a]n abortion deemed necessary based on reasonable medical judgment which was intended to prevent the death or a serious health risk to the pregnant female."
Plaintiffs filed suit seeking a new preliminary injunction, arguing that Senate Bill 2150 has a chilling effect for health care providers rendering care to pregnant women because physicians do not know when an abortion would be "deemed necessary based on reasonable medical judgment.”
According to plaintiffs, the vague language of the statute would prevent physicians from exercising their good faith medical judgment to treat patients with pregnancy complications for fear of liability and criminal prosecution.
Instead of asking the court to enjoin the law as a whole, plaintiffs asked the court only to enjoin enforcement of the statute in certain circumstances—i.e., where physicians exercise "their good faith medical judgment”—essentially, to change application of the exception from "reasonable medical judgment" to "good faith medical judgment."
“Plaintiffs have cited the Court with no legal authority that would allow the Court to re-write the statute in this manner under the pretense of providing injunctive relief,” the court said in denying the motion.
Access Indep. Health Srvs., Inc. v. Wrigley, No. 08-2022-CV-01608 (N.D. Dist. Ct. Jan. 22, 2024).