SCOTUS Temporarily Keeps Abortion Pill Access

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In an emergency ruling on Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court voted to temporarily block the injunction against the abortion pill, known as mifepristone, amid an ongoing legal challenge over its regulatory approval. In an unsigned ruling in Danco Laboratories, LLC v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, et al., a majority of Justices granted an emergency request by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the pill’s manufacturer for a stay of a Texas federal judge’s suspension of the FDA’s approval of the drug until a full appeal of that ruling can be adjudicated. The case is far from over as the matter will move through trial in the District Court.

On April 7, finding in 2000 that the FDA improperly approved mifepristone with “legitimate safety concerns,” U.S. District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk suspended the agency’s approval of the drug and blocked the FDA’s subsequent actions to make it widely accessible. He delayed the order from taking effect for one week to give the government time to appeal. The Biden administration immediately appealed asking the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to put a hold on that ruling, which it did, staying the lower court’s FDA approval suspension. However, it left the rest of Judge Kacsmaryk’s order intact.