Pro-Life Law to Stop Trafficking Teens for Secret Abortions Wins Huge Victory in Court

Right to Life of Idaho lauded the decision by a panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals that allows the state to largely enforce the states Abortion Trafficking Law passed in 2023.

“We are praising God for the many lives this law will save,” they said.

The panel’s decision “reverses U.S. Magistrate Judge Debora K. Grasham’s November 2023 decision, which blocked enforcement of the law after Idaho attorney Lourdes Matsumoto and two advocacy organizations, the Northwest Abortion Access Fund and the Indigenous Idaho Alliance, filed a lawsuit against the state,” according to Mia Maldonado. “The plaintiffs alleged the law restricts freedom of speech, the right to travel and the right to freely associate, and said it was too vague to be constitutional.”

The panel of judges “determined the law is not too vague to be enforced and does not violate the First Amendment rights of the advocacy organizations who filed the lawsuit,” Maldonado wrote, “However, they did affirm Grasham’s block on one ground. The panel held that the language in the law prohibiting ‘recruiting’ activity to obtain an abortion is overly broad and unconstitutional ‘because it prohibits a substantial amount of protected expressive speech.’ But the other aspects of the law that do not allow individuals to ‘harbor’ or ‘transport’ minors for an abortion can stand, according to the ruling.”

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“This is a tremendous victory for Idaho and defending the rule of law as written by the people’s representatives,” said Attorney General Raúl Labrador. “Idaho’s laws were passed specifically to protect the life of the unborn and the life of the mother. Trafficking a minor child for an abortion without parental consent puts both in grave danger.”

The law “makes it illegal to either obtain abortion pills for a minor or to help them leave the state for an abortion without their parents’ knowledge and consent,” according to the Associated Press.

“The law was designed to prevent minors from getting abortions in states where the procedure is legal if they don’t have their parents’ permission,” The AP reported.

LifeNews.com Note: Dave Andrusko is the editor of National Right to Life News and an author and editor of several books on abortion topics. This post originally appeared in at National Right to Life News Today —- an online column on pro-life issues.

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