Vox Sentences - Six-week abortion ban

The Supreme Court allowed a Texas abortion law to take effect; a Bangladeshi court issued death sentences for men who killed a gay rights activist.

Tonight's Sentences was written by Gabby Birenbaum.

The Texas abortion ban

Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images

• After the Supreme Court, which is dominated by conservative appointees, denied an emergency request to delay or block the order, a new Texas law went into effect today that bans abortions at about six weeks after the pregnant person's last period. [Vox / Ian Millhiser]
• The new law, passed by Texas Republicans, makes all abortions after the six-week mark illegal — a threshold before many even know they're pregnant. Texans have lost the legal right to abortion they’ve held for the nearly 50 years since the landmark 1973 Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade. [Houston Chronicle / Jeremy Blackman]
• The law provides no exceptions for rape and incest and is enforced through private lawsuits: Anyone who aids or abets an abortion, from a provider to an Uber driver, is liable to be sued and face a penalty. [Daily Beast / Molly Jong-Fast]
• Those who aid or abet abortions can be sued for up to $10,000, not including legal fees. By using private lawsuits as the enforcement mechanism, Texas Republicans are using a legal workaround that makes it difficult for abortion rights groups to challenge the law in court and aims to have a chilling effect on abortions by creating a fear of being informed on. [Dallas Morning News / BeLynn Hollers and Morgan O’Hanlon]
• Typically, abortion advocates will file legal challenges to state officials, on the grounds that state abortion bans infringe on constitutional rights. But because the Texas ban is enforced by private citizens, there is no clear entity for advocates to sue. It circumvents Roe v. Wade, which protects abortion rights from government interference but does not deal with private citizens. [Time / Abigail Abrams]
• Because pregnancy is considered to have started at the date of someone’s last menstrual cycle, the six-week ban, in effect, gives people just two weeks on average to realize they are pregnant and then make an appointment. [The 19th News / Orion Rummler]
• The effects of the new ban are projected to fall disproportionately on poor and rural women, who cannot afford or do not have the ability to leave the state in order to get an abortion. [Texas Tribune / Neelam Bohra]

• With the ban now in place, all five Planned Parenthood locations in San Antonio, for example, have stopped offering abortion services after the six-week mark. [San Antonio Express-News / Malak Silmi]

Bangladesh death penalty for activist’s killers

• An anti-terrorism court in Bangladesh gave six men a death sentence Tuesday for their 2016 killing of a prominent gay rights activist and his friend. [AP]
• In 2016, six members of a militant Islamist group associated with al-Qaeda attacked and killed Xulhaz Mannan, the editor of Bangladesh’s first LGBTQ+ magazine, and his friend, actor Mahbub Rabbi Tonoy. The lawyer for the six men said they will appeal their sentence. [Australian AP / Ruma Paul]
• The ruling is notable in a country like Bangladesh, which had not granted Mannan permission to publish his magazine. Same-sex relationships are illegal in Bangladesh. [Reuters]
• Mannan’s murder was part of a larger series of attacks against atheists, intellectuals, and activists by Ansar al-Islam, the militant group with connections to al-Qaeda. [NYT / Saif Hasnat and Suhasini Raj]

Three police officers and two paramedics in Aurora, Colorado, were indicted on 32 counts for their involvement in the police killing of Elijah McClain. [Daily Beast / Zoe Richards]

• Previewing the potential 2024 slate of GOP candidates for the presidency, former President Donald Trump, Sens. Tom Cotton (R-AR), Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Marco Rubio (R-FL) have all made stops in or are planning to hold rallies in Iowa. [The Hill / Julia Manchester]
• A New York woman with a popular anti-vaccination Instagram account was charged with selling fake Covid-19 vaccination cards. [BuzzFeed News / Paige Skinner]
• Thirteen American men have advanced to the second round of the US Open tennis tournament, the most since 1994. [LA Times / Helene Elliott]

"This is a de facto overturning of Roe before the Supreme Court has time to hear the Mississippi case. And Texas will now go back to being a pre-Roe state, turning the clock back 50 years."

[Planned Parenthood president Alexis McGill Johnson, on the Supreme Court’s decision to not block Texas’ abortion ban before reviewing another case from Mississippi that directly challenges Roe v. Wade]

Texas didn't just make it almost impossible to get an abortion, the state made it easy to sue somebody who gets one after about six weeks of pregnancy — and anyone who helps. KUT reporter Ashley Lopez explains. [Spotify]

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