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The Biden administration told emergency room doctors they must perform emergency abortions when necessary to save a pregnant woman’s health, following last week’s Supreme Court ruling that failed to settle a legal dispute over whether state abortion bans override a federal law requiring hospitals to provide stabilizing treatment. In a letter being sent Tuesday to doctor and hospital associations, Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Director Chiquita Brooks-LaSure reminded hospitals of their legal duty to offer stabilizing treatment, which could include abortions. (Seitz and Fernando, 7/2)

The Wisconsin Supreme Court decided Tuesday to consider two challenges to a 175-year-old law that conservatives maintain bans abortion without letting the cases wind through lower courts. Abortion advocates stand an excellent chance of prevailing in both cases given the high court’s liberal tilt and remarks a liberal justice made on the campaign trail about how she supports abortion rights. (Richmond, 7/2)

Two hardline anti-abortion delegates to next week’s GOP platform committee have been stripped of their positions, according to several members of the Republican National Committee, underscoring a broader fear among evangelicals and other social conservatives that the party is poised to moderate its stance on abortion at the direction of former President Donald Trump. The Trump campaign’s efforts to block the two South Carolina delegates from the platform committee and replace them with loyalists is described in several affidavits as “interference from paid RNC staff … to circumvent the will of the delegation.” (Allison and Messerly, 7/2)

Pro-choice advocates are set to deliver petition signatures Wednesday in hopes of getting the abortion rights issue on Arizona’s November general election ballot. Organizers collected about 800,000 signatures and need 383,923 of them to be deemed valid. If that happens, Arizona voters will be asked whether to enshrine in the state constitution the right to an abortion. (Berry and Snow, 7/3)

Amarillo residents will vote on a so-called abortion travel ban in November, one of the few times Texas voters will have a say on abortion rights since Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022. (Carver, 7/2)

In many ways, the end of Roe v Wade didn’t happen when the US Supreme Court issued its decision to overrule Roe in the Dobbs case in June 2022. Rather, it came nine months earlier, on September 1, 2021, when the Texas Heartbeat Act, also known as SB8, took effect. The law banned abortion after embryonic cardiac activity became detectable, around six weeks of pregnancy, with no exceptions for fetal abnormalities. (Martin, 7/3)