The case appears to be the first instance of criminal charges against a doctor accused of sending abortion pills to another state, at least since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022 and opened the door for states to have strict anti-abortion laws.
I wouldn’t be so sure of that.
This is very likely going to the Supreme court. And there is a non-zero chance that they will allow states to start enforcing their laws outside of their own borders (of course, they’ll word it in such a way to make sure only Republican states can impose their will on blue states. Once blue states try to impose their own laws, it’ll be viewed upon as retaliation and struck down by the SC because reasons.)
If they manage to get that far (and again, there is a non-zero chance they will), it’s not all that much of a hop, skip, and a jump before it’s perfectly legal for one state to send state troopers to a residence in another state in order to enforce state laws, with the rationale that “criminals cannot simply escape consequences for their crimes by fleeing to a state sympathetic to their cause” or somesuch. (And again, they’ll be sure to make sure that only red states are allowed this luxury.)
And I could very easily see a prosecutor who wants to advance his own legal or political career willing to try this while the entire justice system is extremely MAGA friendly and basically forcing the issue.
I look forward to a massive influx of doctors seeking asylum in Canada if this occurs.
Red states would be OK with that, though.
So would Canada (me), we need more Docs and the US training is good enough for us to give them a license.
To be fair to US doctors (at least in my area), they are among the world’s best trained and knowledgable. It’s just the system they’re forced to work in that sucks. Saying the US doctors are “good enough” doesn’t give them nearly enough credit. Don’t blame the doctors for the faults of the system they’re forced to work under.