RICHMOND (November 1, 2021) – Attorney General Mark R. Herring issued the below statement following this morning’s oral argument in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in the cases of United States of America v. State of Texas et al., and Whole Woman’s Health et al. v. Jackson et al. that seek to block the unconstitutional Texas abortion ban:

“Following this morning’s oral arguments, I feel confident that the Supreme Court will do the right thing and uphold the decades-old precedent that the right to an abortion is protected under our Constitution,” said Attorney General Herring. “Not only does Texas’ law essentially ban all abortions, it also emboldens unchecked vigilantes to take the law into their own hands, something that even the most conservative justices appeared to take issue with. This disgusting law has burdened women in Texas for too long and the Supreme Court must strike it down, preventing further blatantly unconstitutional abortion bans from being passed in other states across the country.”

Attorney General Herring has been in court from the outset fighting back against Texas’ unconstitutional abortion ban. He and his colleagues have filed numerous amicus briefs on behalf of the U.S. Department of Justice in support of their challenge to Texas’ law.

Attorney General Herring has been a strong advocate for women’s healthcare and reproductive rights in Virginia. Last month, Attorney General Herring led a coalition of 21 attorneys general in filing an amicus brief in Planned Parenthood South Atlantic v. Wilson arguing that South Carolina’s six-week abortion ban harms women’s healthcare and a lower court’s ruling blocking the law should be upheld. He has stood against attacks on women’s reproductive freedom and has fought in court to defend women’s access to comprehensive healthcare services, including abortion and birth control. He issued an official advisory opinion that helped protect women’s health clinics from expensive and medically unnecessary retrofits that would have closed many Virginia clinics that offer abortion services. Attorney General Herring successfully fought alongside his colleagues in the Whole Women’s Health case to strike down Texas’s onerous, medically unnecessary regulations and he has fought for women’s reproductive justice around the country, working with colleagues to oppose medically unnecessary restrictions on abortion in Ohio and Alabama. Additionally, he continuously fought against the Trump Administration’s attacks on women’s access to the full range of reproductive health care services and contraception options.

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