The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) announced on Wednesday that the court will hear a case regarding whether or not patients can have access to the abortion pill, following its historic decision two years prior to overturn Roe v. Wade.
As Politico reports, the case involves a conservative group which issued a challenge to Food and Drug Administration (FDA) policies allowing for greater access to the drug mifepristone, which includes online prescriptions, mailing the drug directly to patients, and dispensing the drug at brick-and-mortar pharmacies. However, the court turned down another challenge which would have more broadly targeted the pill by questioning the approval of the drug itself, a case which could have seen a nationwide ban implemented if the justices sided with the challengers.
Oral arguments will most likely begin in the spring, with a decision set to be made by the end of June. Consumers will still be allowed to access the pill in the meantime until the final ruling is made.
The case was brought by the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine (AHM), which claims that the FDA has ignored the health risks associated with mifepristone ever since it was first approved in 2000.
“Every court so far has agreed that the FDA acted unlawfully in removing common-sense safeguards for women and authorizing dangerous mail-order abortions,” said Erin Hawley, senior counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which is representing AHM. “We urge the Supreme Court to do the same. The FDA has harmed the health of women and undermined the rule of law by illegally removing every meaningful safeguard from the chemical abortion drug regimen.”
The abortion pill remains the most common method of abortion, and thus represents the Court’s most important abortion-related case since Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in 2022, which overturned Roe v. Wade and returned the matter of abortion to the individual states. Democrats attempted to weaponize the ruling in their favor in subsequent elections, to mixed results.
The Court’s latest case could give Democrats another chance to promote pro-abortion propaganda ahead of the 2024 election, despite recent evidence suggesting that the public’s interest in the abortion fight is fading.