The court on Monday blocked the imposition of a 24-hour waiting period for abortion after consultation with a doctor and the requirement of notification by two parents for patients under 18, as well as the requirement of informed consent. The ruling also ruled unconstitutional a mandate that only doctors can perform abortions, even those performed with medication, as well as a law requiring abortions after the first trimester to be performed in a hospital. The court cited a 1995 state Supreme Court decision that found access to abortion a constitutional right. “These abortion laws violate the right to privacy because they violate the fundamental right under the Minnesota Constitution to access abortion care and do not withstand strict scrutiny,” Ramsey County Judge Thomas Gilligan wrote in his ruling. . The ruling comes after more than three years of litigation in a case brought by abortion rights groups pushing to overturn more than a dozen abortion restrictions in one fell swoop. The state could appeal, but the ruling appears to reinforce Minnesota’s status as a haven for abortion access in the Midwest after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected federal constitutional protections provided in Roe v. Wade. Neighboring states like South Dakota and Wisconsin have various laws on the books that prohibit abortion. “With abortion bans in half the country set to take effect in the coming weeks and months, it’s more important than ever to leverage protections in state constitutions like Minnesota’s,” said Amanda Allen, director of the Lawyering Project and counsel in the lawsuit. with the Minnesota legal nonprofit Gender Justice. “Minnesota has an opportunity to be a safe place for people in the midst of this national public health crisis.” The decision was quickly criticized by Republican lawmakers and groups opposed to abortion rights, who said the laws were modest measures supporting pregnant women. “Many women have been helped by these policies,” said Scott Fischbach, executive director of Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life, the state’s largest anti-abortion group. “Now they will be harmed as those protections are stripped away by a flagrantly flawed court decision, a decision that goes far beyond Roe v. Wade. This wrong must be righted.” Fischbach said previous U.S. Supreme Court decisions have upheld similar informed consent and parental notification laws. Republicans are already pressing Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, whose office defended the state’s laws in court, to appeal the decision. Ellison, the first DFL attorney general to face re-election in the fall, has vowed to stand up for women who travel to Minnesota to seek abortion care. The case was the first major trial in a world since Doe v. Roe. Gomez, a 1995 Minnesota Supreme Court decision that found access to abortion a constitutional right, going further than Roe v. Wade in ruling that medical assistance can also be used to pay for abortions for low-income women. …
