On Friday, the Kansas Supreme Court struck down a Republican-backed abortion second-trimester ban and affirmed that the state’s constitution protects abortion access, with one justice dissenting.
In two separate decisions released on Friday, the court ruled, “The Kansas Constitution Bill of Rights protects a fundamental right to personal autonomy, which includes a pregnant person’s right to terminate a pregnancy.” The Court also ruled against several state licensing requirements for abortion providers.
The decisions blocked enforcement of a 2015 law supported by Republican legislators that banned the common second-trimester abortion procedure of dilation and evacuation. The Court found that S.B. 95, known as Unborn Protection from Dismemberment Act, violates the Kansas Constitution Bill of Rights and “impairs the right to abortion.”
Newsweek reached out to the Kansas Republican Party for comment via email Friday afternoon. Newsweek reached out via text message to the Party’s chair, Mike Brown, on Friday afternoon.
Tammy Ljungblad/The Kansas City Star via AP
Kansas, a reliably conservative state for decades, has been at the center of national abortion debates in the past few years. In August 2022, just weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in the Dobbs decision which eliminated the federal right to abortion, Kansans overwhelmingly rejected an amendment that sought to remove abortion protections from the state constitution. It was the first vote in the nation of its kind since Dobbs. The majority referenced the 2022 vote in their opinion, stating, “The people spoke with their votes.”
Abortion care advocates have applauded the decisions, such as the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), which filed one of the cases on behalf of an abortion care provider. Nancy Northup, CRR’s president…
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