The U.S. Department of Justice’s lawsuit against the state of Idaho — the first such lawsuit the federal government has filed against a state in the wake of the overturning of Roe v. Wade — is based on important matters of life and death, and raises legitimate questions about how Idaho’s abortion ban would be implemented.
In essence, the DOJ lawsuit contends that Idaho’s trigger law is a violation of the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act because it “preemptively criminalizes all abortions … even where a denial of care will likely result in the death of the patient,” U.S. Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta said during a news conference Tuesday.
The medical community for the past several weeks has been raising these alarms over Idaho’s abortion ban.