Supreme Court rejects challenge to abortion pill mifepristone

Wilshire@lemmy.world to politics @lemmy.world – 248 points –
Supreme Court rejects challenge to abortion pill mifepristone | CNN Politics
cnn.com
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Here's what this means:

If you favor access to reproductive healthcare, you NEED TO VOTE IN NOVEMBER.

The GOP will absolutely vote to restrict access to all reproductive healthcare now that SCOTUS has refused to do so.

They just weakened the NLRB in another opinion and when they destroy the Chevron deference principle this year, the NLRB (and a lot of other regulatory agencies like the FDA, EPA, etc) is going to be neutered.

SCOTUS is potentially on the ballot in November. Hope you all vote with reproductive access and labor rights in mind.

Anyone care to ELI5 nlrb and chevron deference?

The National Labor Relations Board is the federal agency that is responsible for regulating labor and workers' rights. 15-20 times a year, they use a court injunction to force a company to rehire employees that were fired due to attempted unionization (usually hidden under a BS other reason). The court made it much harder for those injunctions to be granted, meaning unionization efforts are going to be chilled.

The Chevron deference principle refers to a principle stemming from a prior case that effectively defers to federal agencies over courts when there are questions on implicit powers of those agencies. Weakening or destroying this effectively means any power for a federal agency must be explicitly granted in the text of a law, which republicans will never, ever do or allow. This is going to severely undercut the powers of every federal agency we have in varying degrees. Another conservative wet dream.

Thanks! And it sounds like we’re going to be screwed once these are changed.

I'm really, really worried about it. The FDA is going to lose powers it uses to ensure our food and medicine isn't killing us. The EPA is going to effectively be an advisory agency after this. The FTC looked like it might be back in business this admin, and it's going to be neutered. I'm not even explicitly opposed to this if our legislative branch wasn't inept and/or captured, but... we all know it is and it's not getting better soon.

Hopefully they kill the FDA and all drink raw milk to death, idk.

My republican friends can eat bat at the meat market on the corner, I’m gonna stick with the FDA certified grocery store…

Chevron deference <------- Non-ELI5

Not a law-talker type here, but essentially, when the legislature creates an agency like the FDA, it delegates powers to them to make rulings on certain matters but does not specifically legislate every decision that agency has to make. It says that the FDA can make rulings about drug safety, but it doesn't say explicitly what drugs the FDA can make decisions about.

In this particular case, the FDA has said that a drug, mifepristone, is safe and doctors can prescribe it to patients. The law suit claimed that the FDA overstepped it's authority because the legislature never explicitly gave the FDA the power to do that. This is a flawed argument because SCOTUS already decided, in the linked case above, that it was inappropriate for the court to substitute its own interpretation of a rule on an issue like this where the legislature gave an agency an implicit power to make such a decision as long as the agency's decision is reasonable.

That is the Chevron Deference. It means that the courts should defer to agency rulings when those rulings are reasonable even if the power to make the ruling is only implicitly granted to the agency.

I may not be dead on the mark here, but I think I'm fairly close. If not, I'm sure some real law-talker type will be along to correct me.

Not a lawyer either, to be clear. I think your general description holds, but the example wouldn't. Individual drugs would still fall under the explicit granted ability to regulate "drugs" as a whole. I think the injunction power referenced in today's NLRB ruling might be a good example actually, even if they didn't explicitly reject it via this mechanism today.

Yep. It’s insane how quickly we’re spiraling into a fucking christian theocracy… anything less than voting for Biden in November is tacit support for Trump and the GOP and I don’t care whether or not people on Lemmy like hearing that fact. We have one chance to save our democracy. Vote like your life depends on it.

I'm just wondering what the supposed benefit of a protest vote even is and how it stacks up against what we lost as a result of 2016? On one hand there's Dobbs, weakening of every federal agency, millions dead from a fumbled pandemic response. On the other, there's... Wait, what is there?

As much as I hate how things are developing, no. We're not spiraling into a theocracy. Some States, for sure. But at the Federal, nah.

Having said that, I agree with you. The only way to continue ensuring the encroaching of these fucks is by voting.

Edit: I'm not denying that there is a problem. I'm just saying that it's not as hopeless as it sounds. We still need to continue taking action.

But at the Federal, nah.

lmao WHAT? You should start paying attention to the Supreme Court because maybe then you'd understand what an incredibly stupid statement this is, el barto.

Oh I do! Don't get me wrong. Those fucks are fucking shit up. I know that. But we're still the majority, and we'll show them.

It's too bad the D's won't put up a candidate like our lives depend on it.

A perfect candidate for you is an imperfect candidate for others in the democratic coalition. There is no perfect democratic candidate and we will all have to compromise on as least some levels. Biden has delivered a lot of stellar wins for most democrats and even the side of the party further to the left. Our largest unifying belief right now is in defeating fascism at home. We cannot pursue purity at the expense of progress.

Ding ding ding, this is the answer.

ALL of politics is about building consensus and compromise. Every single bit. There will never be a candidate that you agree with on every single issue; that means that you're always going to have to vote strategically, and decide which issues are the most important to you.

As anyone that combs through my post history will not, I'm very, very pro-2A; I oppose almost all restrictions on gun rights, I think that the past-'86 ban of FOPA should be thrown out, and I'd be fine with the Nat'l Firearms Act of 1934 being ruled unconstitutional. On the other hand, I also support religious plurality and freedom--including especially the freedom from religion--reproductive rights, voting rights for everyone, non-discrimination, LGBTQ+ rights, and support the right of cops to eat a sack of dicks. So even though gun rights are very important to me, I'm extremely unlikely to ever vote Republican. Especially since I live in a state where it's very unlikely I'll ever have to worry about losing my 2A rights, but my partner has to worry about losing their access to reproductive healthcare.

And I hate guns and would happily amend the second out of the constitution. I'm sure we both have our reasons behind our beliefs and I respect yours, truly (I only bring this up to illustrate our differences btw, not trying to start a spat). I have my own objections to some Dem candidates and policies, certainly. I love you all though, because we are allies in a much more critical endeavor than any wedge issue: the continuation of our freedom and basic democratic norms. I just don't feel that it's hard to compromise this way and it's the clear path to victory, even for the more divisive issues you care about.

When has the party put up a new candidate to replace an incumbent with a term to go?

I'm not sure this was made clear, but THERE IS NO CHOICE 'C'. there's no "none of the above" that works. It's a binary choice, and we can't bargain around it. Vote for Biden or accept all of Trump. Every other choice other than voting for Biden is enabling Trump. Staying home? Trump. Spoiling a ballot? Trump.

That's it.

Yeah, it sucks. We get that. Largely, we agree. He's got faults. He's made mistakes. He's made concessions. Still, it's like this:

Vote for Biden or accept Trump.

Oh no. You misread that. They unanimously refused because of Standing. This is a reaction to the cases they ruled on where it turned out the plaintiffs were entirely theoretical. Kavanaugh laid out exactly the standard under which this group could get Standing and return to SCOTUS.

So this is far from dead. A decision on the merits will likely go as we all expect.

Don’t be fooled by this decision. Christofascists in SCOTUS are waiting for repubes to pass legislation that will ban these meds after which the same SCOTUS will rubber stamp the law.

Vote because your democracy depends on it

Dems need to get off their asses and solidify rvw into law.

They. Cannot. Do. This. Legislators cannot just wake up really motivated one day and enshrine reproductive rights. They need numbers, and we have to give it to them for that to happen. There's no alternative, no magical ideal route just waiting for the perfect congress person. Republicans will pull out all the stops on this, so you need a filibuster-proof majority. Give the Dems that and you'll get reproductive rights.

4 months (with a flimsy proper majority due to Lieberman) gave us the ACA, one of the most impactful pieces of legislation regarding healthcare the country has ever seen. We need to vote in large numbers to achieve our political ends.

The Republicans seem to be really good at passing bullshit laws, the dems just don't seem to be able to get it together. And yea they have had a few sessions where they were filibuster proof majority...

They had 4 months. And they passed the ACA.

Which was written by the insurance companies, and hasn't done really any good. They should have crammed through single payer while tossing up their middle fingers to the red team.

hasn't done really any good.

My partner was able to have a surgery this year she would not have been able to otherwise. She got medications she never would have been able to afford. Sure looks like a bunch of good from over here, but maybe I'm biased. Maybe we can ask them?

They tried with soldify access to contraceptives but the GQP shot it down

They should keep trying for abortion access and contraceptives but with the current Congress it's going to be an uphill battle to say the least

Literally what they're paid to do. I'm so tired of them getting a pass because the GOP will cause problems...they seem to constantly let the gop pass shit laws.

I'm sorry that you give the dems a pass, while the repubs seem to be just steamrolling shit into law. Either this country is not as left leaning as people think or the repubs get shit done with less support.

Can you give me an example of a law steam rolled into place by Republicans in the way you describe? Should be easy.

Edit: Any of the downvoting cowards can feel free to chime in with the republican-passed laws that they shoved past the democratic attempts to stop them. I'll wait!

You're joking right? Literally turned the SCOTUS red, and removed RvW all within the last few years. The red team continues to steamroll the blue team, all while the blue team just says they can't do anything cause they're going to get blocked by the red team...

Right so you have no idea how our government works. I ask for laws and I get SCOTUS. You view it that way because it is all one big number in your head shifting back and forth, because you have no civics education. It's sad.

https://civilrights.org/trump-rollbacks/

Dude what the fuck are you talking about, tons of negative shit was passed by trump and the repubs just in his 4 years. Do you want me to go back to bush era?

Almost everything listed is an executive order. Democrats cannot stop those (other than at the ballot box). Try again. L-A-W. It's a bill, passed by both chambers of Congress, signed by the president. Like the Affordable Care Act, the Inflation Reduction Act? Can you give me a single one? Hell, I even left the doors wide open to give me the fucking omnibus from each year and you couldn't even do that. Know why? Because you have no idea how your government works.

Lol you didn't even read the first few lines of that link. But w/e man. We're in this situation because people like you give dems a pass.

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No they don't.

Sure they do. But they don't right now.

They're not Trump. That's the vote. You can be a single-issue voter if you like, because we all are. Our single-voter issue is preserving the ability to vote other issues later.

RvW is important; my god, is it important. School-kid safety is important. Gun safety is important. Healthcare is important.

Democracy is crucial. It keeps those other things possible. We lose that and every.other.important.matter is dead. It's cutting off the nose to spite the face. It's fiddling while Rome burns. It's deck chairs on the Titanic. It's a lively sports discussion while you're landing the Hindenburg.

You want RvW? Vote Biden for a chance or it's not happening ever. I want strong gun safety regs and healthcare. Biden for a glimmer of hope or nothing at all.

The pattern is real. Every single-issue voter needs to protect their issue by voting not-Trump, and we argue our real issues once we can safely do so.

At the risk of sounding like I'm disagreeing, I mean, technically those things remain possible, it's just that acquiring them requires a great deal of organized violence that we aren't prepared to inflict.

Also, accelerationism is bad and it literally never works out well for us. Pinch your nose and vote for Biden in '24.

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It was an issue of standing. There will be another fight.

This is the best summary I could come up with:


Turning to the anti-abortion doctors and medical groups that sued the federal government over the current regulatory regime for the drug, Kavanaugh wrote that the plaintiffs suffered neither the monetary nor the physical injuries that could have established standing.

But the doctors, many of whom have long been associated with the anti-abortion movement, claimed that they faced the risk of being forced to treat patients dealing with complications from the drug, such as heavier-than-expected bleeding.

At the Supreme Court hearing earlier this year, several justices — including members of the conservative bloc – expressed doubt that the doctors had overcome a procedural threshold known as standing, which requires plaintiffs to show that they had been harmed by the government’s actions.

None of the doctors who submitted declarations to a lower court actually prescribe mifepristone and none pointed to an instance when they were personally required to complete an abortion for a patient who had complications after taking the drug.

The lead medical group in the suit, the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, was incorporated in Amarillo, Texas, months before it filed the lawsuit – allowing it to choose a court where it was guaranteed to be assigned to Kacsmaryk, who was appointed to the bench by former President Donald Trump.

The Biden administration sued the state over that prohibition, arguing that a federal law requires hospitals that receive Medicare funding to provide stabilizing care in emergency rooms, including abortions, when the health of the pregnant woman is at stake.


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Alternative headline: US Supreme Court surprised all by agreeing with the bare minimum and not forcing partisan political opinions into laws.