This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/keep_track by /u/rusticgorilla on 2024-01-09 18:51:53.
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14th Amendment
The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear Donald Trump’s appeal of the Colorado decision banning him from appearing on the state’s ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment (Keep Track’s previous post on the subject). Oral arguments are set for February 5, less than a month before many states hold their presidential primary.
The case will present questions that the U.S. Supreme Court has never had to grapple with before, ahead of an election of the utmost importance to the future of the nation. While it is fairly certain that the majority of justices will disapprove of insurrection, there are numerous ways the court could side with Trump without outright approving his inciting an insurrection. Any of the following questions could bring a swift end to Colorado’s case:
- Is the presidency an “office” and is the president an “officer” subject to Section 3, as Colorado ruled?
- Is Section 3 self-executing, as Colorado ruled, or must Congress first pass legislation allowing states to enforce it?
- Did Trump “engage in insurrection,” as Colorado ruled, or did the First Amendment protect his inciting statements?
- Does Section 3’s prohibition on an insurrectionist “holding” office also mean that an insurrectionist can’t run for office? (In this scenario, if an insurrectionist won the election, that person would be able to petition Congress to have the disqualification removed and then take office)
- And, finally, a perennial favorite: Are challenges to the constitutional qualifications of a candidate for President a “political question” not suited for the courts to decide?
Abortion
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday agreed to take up a case against Idaho’s strict abortion ban, but allowed the state to continue to enforce its law while the legal battle is underway.
Background: In 2020, Idaho passed a trigger law to automatically ban all abortions if Roe v. Wade was ever overturned. As we now know, the U.S. Supreme Court did exactly that two years later, allowing Idaho’s ban to take effect. The law, called the Defense of Life Act, provides that “[e]very person who performs or attempts to perform an abortion…commits the crime of criminal abortion” and is subject to at least two years imprisonment. The only instance when a physician can legally perform an abortion is when the procedure is “necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman,” assuming the physician is willing to risk the chance that a jury would disagree with their “good faith medical judgment.” As we’ve seen in Texas, which has a similar provision in its abortion ban, this so-called exemption functions as window-dressing designed to make it easier for politicians to sell such a cruel law to their constituents.
State-level bans on abortion, like Idaho’s, conflict with a federal law called the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA), which requires all hospitals that receive Medicare funding to stabilize patients with emergency medical conditions. EMTALA defines “emergency medical condition” as:
a medical condition manifesting itself by acute symptoms of sufficient severity (including severe pain) such that the absence of immediate medical attention could reasonably be expected to result in—
(i) placing the health of the individual (or, with respect to a pregnant woman, the health of the woman or her unborn child) in serious jeopardy,
(ii) serious impairment to bodily functions, or
(iii) serious dysfunction of any bodily organ or part.
Thus, EMTALA requires treatment to stabilize a patient even when that patient’s condition is not (yet) life-threatening and even when that treatment is an abortion in a state that bans the procedure.
Lawsuit: In August 2022, the Department of Justice sued Idaho, arguing that EMTALA preempts the state’s abortion ban under the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. District Judge Lynn Winmill, a Clinton appointee, ruled in favor of the DOJ and issued a preliminary injunction barring enforcement of Idaho’s ban “to the extent it conflicts with EMTALA.”
Here, it is impossible to comply with both statutes. As already discussed, when pregnant women come to a Medicare-funded hospital with an emergency medical condition, EMTALA obligates the treating physician to provide stabilizing treatment, including abortion care. But regardless of the pregnant patient’s condition, Idaho statutory law makes that treatment a crime. And where federal law requires the provision of care and state law criminalizes that very care, it is impossible to comply with both laws. Full stop.
…the Court finds that allowing the Idaho law to go into effect would threaten severe, irreparable harm to pregnant patients in Idaho…Not only would Idaho Code § 18-622 prevent emergency care mandated by EMTALA, it would also discourage healthcare professionals from providing any abortions—even those that might ultimately be deemed to have been necessary to save the patient’s life
After some back-and-forth, the full Ninth Circuit ultimately upheld Judge Winmill’s injunction. Idaho appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking it to stay the injunction. Contrary to the DOJ’s argument that EMTALA requires stabilizing treatment, including abortion, for pregnant people experiencing a medical emergency, Idaho argues that “EMTALA is silent on abortion and actually requires stabilizing treatment for the unborn children of pregnant women.”
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court announced it would hear the case and—over the objections of the federal government—granted Idaho’s request for a stay, allowing the state to continue to deny pregnant people critical emergency medical treatment. This is the second major abortion case the Supreme Court will hear this term, the other dealing with access to the crucial medication abortion drug mifepristone.
Related: The Fifth Circuit also ruled against EMTALA in favor of Texas’s abortion ban last week. A three-judge panel, made up of a G.W. Bush appointee and two Trump appointees, reasoned that EMTALA does not conflict with state abortion bans because it “requires hospitals to stabilize both the pregnant woman and her unborn child,” thus precluding an abortion. As Ian Millhiser explains in Vox, this is a dishonest reading of EMTALA. Instead, what the law actually requires, is that a hospital offers the patient stabilizing treatment and allows them to make an informed decision:
EMTALA states that a hospital meets its obligations if it “offers” the patient stabilizing treatment and informs that patient “of the risks and benefits to the individual of such examination and treatment.” So, in a case where a patient is forced to choose between an abortion, which will stabilize their own condition, or a treatment that would save the fetus but leave the pregnant patient at risk, EMTALA requires a hospital to offer the patient either treatment and to explain the terrible choice facing them. And then it requires the hospital to honor the patient’s choice.
In other news: “Florida appeals court rejects minor’s attempt to get abortion without consent,” South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Redistricting and voting rights
New York
New York’s highest court ordered the state to draw new congressional districts ahead of the 2024 elections, giving Democrats a better chance to retake the U.S. House. The 4-3 majority based their decision on the way 2022’s map was created—not by the bipartisan commission, as required by law, but by a court-appointed special master.
Background: In 2014, New York voters approved a [constitutional amendment](https://ballotpedia.or…
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