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 The legal battle in St. Louis comes a week after Missouri Governor
Mike Parson, a Republican, signed a bill banning abortion beginning
in the eighth week of pregnancy, making Missouri one of eight U.S.
states that have passed anti-abortion legislation this year.
Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit against Missouri this week after
state health officials said the license for Reproductive Health
Services of Planned Parenthood in St. Louis was in jeopardy because
they were unable to interview seven of its physicians over
“potential deficient practices," documents filed in a St. Louis
court showed.
The circuit judge in the case, Michael Stelzer, was expected on
Friday to rule on Planned Parenthood's request for a temporary
restraining order and injunction against the state, according to
local media.
If Stelzer rules against Planned Parenthood, the clinic's license to
perform abortions would expire at midnight, making Missouri the only
U.S. state without an abortion clinic since the Supreme Court's Roe
v. Wade decision in 1973 that established a woman’s right to
terminate her pregnancy.
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Abortion is one of the most socially divisive issues in U.S.
politics, with opponents often citing religious beliefs to call it
immoral, while abortion-rights advocates say the bans amount to
state control of women's bodies.
On Thursday, pro-abortion demonstrators held a rally in downtown St.
Louis, where police arrested Alderman Megan Ellyia Green and several
Planned Parenthood board members during a sit-in at the Wainwright
State Office Building, the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported.
Anti-abortion activists say they aim to prompt the newly installed
conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn Roe v.
Wade by enacting laws that are virtually assured of facing court
challenges.
(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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