(Atlanta) A state judge on Monday refused to immediately suspend enforcement of Georgia’s restrictive abortion law, which went into effect last month and bans most abortions once the fetal heart activity is present.
Posted at 6:09 p.m.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ruled he lacked the authority to issue a preliminary injunction and block the law at this stage of the proceedings.
He stressed that his decision did not affect the merits of the case, which will still be heard.
Whether it is constitutional for the state to compel a woman to carry a six-week embryo to term against her will, even in the face of serious medical risk, remains unanswered.
Judge Robert McBurney, in his decision
The law prohibits most abortions once a “detectable human heartbeat” is present. Cardiac activity can be detected by ultrasound in the cells of an embryo that will eventually become the heart as early as the sixth week of pregnancy. This means that most abortions in Georgia are effectively banned at a time when many women do not yet know they are pregnant.
“We are deeply disappointed that the Court will allow our state’s sweeping six-week abortion ban to remain in place and put thousands of Georgian women at risk by denying them essential health care,” the statement said in the statement. a statement Monica Simpson, executive director of SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective. The group is the main plaintiff in the case.
An email to a spokeswoman for the state’s attorney general’s office, Kara Richardson, did not immediately receive a response. The state had argued that the judge could not halt enforcement of the law while the challenge to its constitutionality unfolded.
The suit presented to Judge McBurney on July 26 argues that the state’s abortion law violates “fundamental rights of liberty and privacy” under the Georgia Constitution.