WASHINGTON, D.C. (Feb. 8, 2016) — Texas’ law requiring widely adopted medical clinic safeguards in abortion facilities is constitutionally sound and ensures that women are not victimized by substandard care, according to a brief filed at the U.S. Supreme Court by American Civil Rights Union attorney Ken Klukowski.

Submitted on behalf of Concerned Women for America and the Susan B. Anthony List on Feb. 3, the amicus brief in the potential landmark case Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt involves a Texas law that requires equal protection for the health and safety of women in abortion clinics operating in the state.

The brief contends that failure to adopt standard medical clinic rules, such as requiring doctors to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, would harm the clinics’ clients. Far from eliminating discrimination against women, absence of the law would result in “subjecting women to healthcare that is of inferior quality to that enjoyed by men in the state of Texas,” the brief states.

Liberal opponents of the law argue that abortion laws burden women as a group. The ACRU’s brief argues that while those charges are false, that even if such allegations were true, the Texas law easily satisfies the test required by the Fourteenth Amendment for laws that impact Americans based on gender, a test that courts call “intermediate scrutiny.”

In fact, the law involves a compelling interest — protecting women from becoming victims of substandard care.

Oral argument will be heard on March 2nd and a decision will be announced by the end of June.
READ THE AMICUS BRIEF HERE.