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Lubbock County, Texas, joins a group of other rural Texas counties that have voted to ban women from using their roads to seek abortions.
This comes after six cities and counties in Texas have passed abortion-related bans, out of nine that have considered them. However, this ordinance makes Lubbock the biggest jurisdiction yet to pass restrictions on abortion-related transportation.
During Monday’s meeting, the Lubbock County Commissioners Court passed an ordinance banning abortion, abortion-inducing drugs and travel for abortion in the unincorporated areas of Lubbock County, declaring Lubbock County a “Sanctuary County for the Unborn.”
The ordinance is part of a continued strategy by conservative activists to further restrict abortion since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade as the ordinances are meant to bolster Texas’ existing abortion ban, which allows private citizens to sue anyone who provides or “aids or abets” an abortion after six weeks of pregnancy.
The ordinance, which was introduced to the court last Wednesday, was passed by a vote of 3-0 with commissioners Terence Kovar, Jason Corley and Jordan Rackler, all Republicans, voting to pass the legislation while County Judge Curtis Parrish, Republican, and Commissioner Gilbert Flores, Democrat, abstained from the vote.
They cannot because they do not have jurisdiction at all. You can’t prosecute someone for doing something legal in another area.
That’s the loophole they’re trying to use. You can’t punish them for the abortion, so you punish them for using public roads for disallowed purposes (driving to abortion). They do have jurisdiction over road use.
They dont really have jurisdiction over road use because of the interstate commerce clause either.
Thats why they claim this bullshit law doesnt cause any conflict, because they aren’t restricting use of the road, they are just “making it easier for private citizens to sue people that help women doing something legal one state over” which is of course restricting use of the road, but pretending its not.
Yeah, it’s absolutely ridiculous and hopefully it won’t stand up to a challenge. But the fact that it exists, and no one wants to be the one going to court to fight the government, means that it will still have an effect on these women.
There’s two things that apply in this situation. The first is that like several other states, they’re not making getting an abortion in another state illegal, they’re making traveling on their infrastructure for the purposes of obtaining an abortion in another state illegal. Is that an unconstitutional restriction on interstate commerce? Who the fuck knows anymore? I don’t think it will hold, but I didn’t expect Justice Thomas to rise like Cthulhu from his eternal and well grifted slumber to kill Roe, so I’m not offering an opinion on that.
The second way, and this is also worrying me, is that while they can’t make flying to California to smoke pot illegal, they can make having pot in your system when you land back in Texas illegal. If they can’t make having an abortion in CA illegal, can they still use medical records to track that your pregnancy was terminated out of state, and prosecute you on a charge after returning to the state with a terminated pregnancy?
To be honest, I think that will fail too, but I’m sure it’ll land on the books someplace.
I’m also sure that these will all become national level laws because people still think politics is a team sport, and if it does not terrify you that the worst president in the history of the US and with openly fascist statements of taking full control and going after his enemies is running neck and neck with just a regular pre-2000s style politician, you’re either not paying attention or you’re privileged as all fuck.
This is my take as well. I hope folks figure it out and that laws like these get wiped out.
This is why I as a Canadian can’t fathom why Americans seem to think they have more freedom than I do somehow. To me the whole “States Rights” debacle essentially gives Americans two countries worth of laws that they are bound by instead of one.
The fact the US also enforces it’s laws on non-citizens for things done outside it’s country legally gives the whole thing the sense of the US being drunk on it’s own sovereignty. Like it’s legal to smoke pot here but if you are tricked into mentioning at a US boarder crossing that you EVER smoked weed on Canadian soil even if it was in the distant past you risk being forever barred from entry into the US.
And to be clear this is not their citizens doing things in their own country that are not illegal by the measure of that country’s law. From what I understand there isn’t much of an appeal process either because once it’s done our citizenry suddenly goes into category “not my monkey not my circus”.
The US is very very fond of restriction of freedoms from an outsider perspective.
I’m not super sure that applies here - they aren’t being punished (legally) for getting the abortion, but for using the roads to get there. It seems to me conceptually similar to how European companies aren’t allowed to sell drugs that are used for lethal injection to the US, even though those drugs are legal to sell in Europe: They aren’t being punished for taking part in an execution that’s legal where it happens, just for doing something that enables it in a place where it isn’t legal. Same deal here.
I’m sure it’s an unconstitutional/illegal law for some other reason, I just don’t think this specific reason applies.
I’m excited to see the faces when this is used to regulate guns.
Sorry sir, but in this here county you can’t take guns out of your yard. To include bringing them in the first place.
The guns that are in your home stay put and your rights are intact.
Nope, that will not happen. Our 2A rights are iron-clad and that would be a clear infringement on the right to bear arms.