Supreme Court Set to Allow Emergency Abortions in Idaho

The U.S. Supreme Court is likely to allow abortions in Idaho during medical emergencies, reinstating a lower court's ruling prioritizing the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) over state laws. This follows a briefly leaked document and marks the second major abortion ruling disclosure before formal issue.

The U.S. Supreme Court appears poised to allow abortions to be performed in Idaho in cases of medical emergencies for pregnant women, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing a copy of a ruling it said was briefly posted on the court's website.

A court spokesperson said in a statement that a document was "inadvertently and briefly uploaded" to the court's website, and that the opinion in the case "will be issued in due course." According to the Bloomberg report, the decision would effectively reinstate a lower court's ruling that had found that Idaho's near-total abortion ban must yield to a 1986 U.S. law known as the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) when the two statutes conflict. EMTALA ensures that patients can receive emergency care at hospitals that receive funding under the federal Medicare program.

The document that was briefly posted indicated that the court's vote was 6-3, with conservative Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch in dissent, according to Bloomberg, which reported that the court had decided to dismiss the case after determining it should not have been granted. The court is nearing the end of its current term and is expected to release its final decisions in the coming days. It still has major rulings pending on cases including former President Donald Trump's bid for immunity from prosecution and challenges to federal regulatory agencies.

The development on Wednesday marked the second time in two years that a major Supreme Court ruling on abortion has been disclosed before being formally issued by the justices. In May 2022, a draft of a ruling authored by Justice Samuel Alito of the decision that overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade precedent that had legalized abortion nationwide was leaked a month before being formally issued. The culprit behind that leak has never been identified.

EMTALA requires hospitals that receive funding under the federal Medicare program to "stabilize" patients with emergency medical conditions. Hospitals that violate EMTALA can face lawsuits by injured patients, civil fines and potentially the loss of Medicare funding. Following Roe's demise, Biden's administration issued federal guidance stating that EMTALA takes precedence over state abortion bans in the relatively rare instances in which the two conflict, and filed a lawsuit challenging Idaho's ban.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)