On Thursday, Texas Judge Maya Guerra Gamble issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) barring the state of Texas from preventing Katie Cox, a woman with severe pregnancy complications, to have an abortion. Cox’s child suffers from Trisomy 18, also known as Edwards Syndrome, a fetal anomaly that, 50 percent of the time, results in the fetus dying before or during birth, with 95 percent of those surviving past that dying painful deaths within the next two weeks. Cox also has a high likelihood of losing her ability to have another baby should she be forced to deliver this one.
In response, Attorney General Ken Paxton sent out letters to Texas hospitals informing them that the TRO is temporary and that Texas will go after any hospital that provides Ms. Cox with the necessary abortion as soon as it is up. He also sent writ of mandamus to the state Supreme Court demanding they vacate the TRO.
He wrote:
The trial court entered a temporary restraining order allowing Plaintiffs to perform and procure an abortion of a single child even though Plaintiffs failed to plead and prove that they satisfy the requirements for a medical-emergency exception. By applying language not found in Texas law, the trial court’s order represents an expansion of the statutory exceptions to Texas’s abortion prohibitions. Because the life of an unborn child is at stake, this Court should require a faithful application of Texas statutes prior to determining that an abortion is permitted.
This Court should issue an emergency stay and mandamus relief. Should the abortion occur while the TRO is in place, nothing will prevent enforcement of Texas’s civil and criminal penalties once the TRO erroneously prohibiting enforcement is vacated. But enforcement of Texas’s laws will not restore the unborn child’s life lost in the interim. That irreparable loss necessitates this Court’s immediate action. Relators therefore respectfully request that this Court issue mandamus relief.
The child’s life is already “lost.” It has a fatal fetal anomaly. It is not going to survive and if it does survive, it will likely only live a few hours or a few days and those hours or days will very likely not be pleasant — and will be even more heartbreaking for Cox and her husband than an abortion would be. Especially if she were to lose her ability to have a child.
Late last night, the Texas Supreme Court — a governmental body made up of judges, not doctors — did as Paxton requested.
In other words, they determined, against the advice of Ms. Cox’s doctor, to force her to remain pregnant until the court can determine for itself whether or not she qualifies for a medical exemption, which could very well not happen until she actually gives birth.
This is not about ensuring that an infant will get to live for a few hours outside of the womb, this is about the fact that Paxton fears that if Katie Cox is allowed her abortion, it will chip away at his gross and purposely vague anti-abortion laws. Indeed, he believes that this is the whole purpose of this suit.
If you are wondering why Texas’ law does not include an exception for fatal fetal anomalies, it is because anti-abortion types are obsessed with forcing women to give birth to babies with no chance of survival because if they somehow did survive, it would be a miracle. They just want to give Jesus a chance to do a miracle! And they love miracles! Especially when they can then use said miracles as a cudgel against others facing similarly horrifying diagnoses who may want to have abortions. These are the people that Ken Paxton wants to make happy. Well, them and (allegedly) the occasional real estate developer.
There are people out there who thoughtfully consider everything before deciding what they want to do or what they think is right. These are people who might be moved by certain circumstances or arguments to change or adjust their viewpoint, people who might be able to make exceptions. That is not Ken Paxton. There are other people who just kind of decide which team they want to be on, go with whatever it seems like they want and reel in the praise and accolades. That is Ken Paxton.
Paxton is not going to change his mind because he loves being a hero to those who oppose abortion rights more than he cares about anyone’s life. Paxton sees any exception made as a threat to the abortion laws that he wants to be his legacy and he’s not going to let Katie Cox or any other woman about to give birth to a dead baby and lose her ability to have another one stand in the way of that.
UPDATE: Turns out that one of the judges who issued the ruling has previously been arrested 37 times for protesting abortion clinics and bragged in his campaign ad about his wife surviving a labor that was supposed to kill her just to watch their baby die an hour after it was born, but he swears that this does not mean he can’t issue an unbiased reading in this matter. Texas!
