Texas Attorney General Sues Biden Administration Over Abortion Push

After President Joe Biden signed an executive order last week aimed at expanding access to abortion, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is fighting back.

This week, Paxton filed a lawsuit against the U.S Department of Health and Human Services, arguing they are misusing the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) to justify Biden’s abortion executive order. The order mandates that hospitals must perform abortions as part of “stabilizing” and “emergency medical care.”

Biden’s order comes in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe vs. Wade, returning the decision of the legality of abortion to the states. And while states like Texas have declared abortion illegal, the Biden administration is fighting to make abortions readily available at any hospital or emergency room.

However, Paxton says that EMTALA cannot be used to authorize the federal government to control the performance of medical procedures—particularly killing a child in the womb, which “forces hospitals and doctors to commit crimes and risk their licensure under Texas law.”

Paxton adds that abortion—in more than 99 percent of cases where both the mother and child are healthy—is not “stabilizing treatment” for an “emergency medical condition.”

“This administration has a hard time following the law, and now they are trying to have their appointed bureaucrats mandate that hospitals and emergency medicine physicians perform abortions,” said Paxton. “I will ensure that President Biden will be forced to comply with the Supreme Court’s important decision concerning abortion and I will not allow him to undermine and distort existing laws to fit his administration’s unlawful agenda.”

The full complaint may be read here.

Jake Peterson

Jake Peterson is a journalism fellow for Texas Scorecard. During high school he competed in speech and debate and now works to teach the unbiased truth, and expose corruption.