Protesters Flood The Streets As Judge Mulls Decision In Case Over Missouri’s Last Remaining Abortion Clinic
The clinic's license is set to expire, but the state won't reissue it because it says it has safety concerns it wants to continue to investigate. If the judge does not rule in favor of the clinic, Planned Parenthood officials said Missouri would become the first state without a functioning abortion clinic since the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.
A judge is deciding whether to ensure Missouri's only abortion clinic can keep its license past Friday, the latest development in a decades-long push by abortion opponents to get states to enact strict rules on the procedure. Like many states, Missouri over the years enacted a series of regulations, ranging from waiting periods before women can receive abortions to rules on the width of clinic doors. (5/30)
Lawyers for Planned Parenthood on Thursday told a St. Louis Circuit Court judge that Missouri health officials have delayed renewing a license to the state鈥檚 sole abortion provider by continually asking for additional information. In a hearing, Planned Parenthood鈥檚 lawyers asked Judge Michael Stelzer to issue a temporary restraining order barring the state Department of Health and Senior Services from denying to renew the license for its St. Louis clinic. That license expires at midnight Friday. (Fentem and Davis, 5/30)
The battle over abortion rights in Missouri spilled from the courtroom into city streets on Thursday as hundreds of people gathered near the St. Louis Arch to demand state officials stop trying to limit access to abortion. Carrying signs that read 鈥淚 Stand With Planned Parenthood鈥 and 鈥淧rotect Safe, Legal Abortion,鈥 they were there to protest he state鈥檚 efforts to limit access to abortion and the potential closing of the state鈥檚 only abortion provider. (Fentem, 5/31)
Missouri is part of a recent wave of state laws that would ban abortion almost entirely, sometimes without exceptions for rape and incest. The state is also making news on abortion for trying to deny its one remaining abortion provider, a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Louis, its license on grounds of alleged violations. (Brangham, 5/30)
The national abortion debate is raging with renewed fervor, as a series of states pass restrictive laws banning almost all instances of the procedure. Among those states is Missouri, where officials are also trying to shutter its only remaining abortion provider, a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Louis. (Brangham, 5/30)
Missouri has long had some of the strictest abortion restrictions in the U.S. Now questions about Planned Parenthood鈥檚 license in St. Louis could mean Missouri losing its only abortion clinic. Below, find FAQs and answers based on our reporting.聽A St. Louis Circuit Court judge is expected to decide whether to stop Missouri from closing the only remaining abortion clinic in the state before its license expires Friday at midnight. (Toler, 5/30)
