Kentucky’s law subjecting women to harassment and an unneeded medical procedure before they can obtain an abortion will stand after the Supreme Court refused to take up a challenge to it. The law forces women to have an ultrasound and then listen to a doctor describing the fetus’ development shown in the ultrasound and to a recording of fetal cardiac activity. Patients cannot refuse to hear these things, and victims of rape or incest are not exempted.
“By refusing to review the Sixth Circuit’s ruling, the Supreme Court has rubber-stamped extreme political interference in the doctor-patient relationship,” ACLU lawyer Alexa Kolbi-Molinas said.
The American Civil Liberties Union challenged this as a free speech issue for doctors, with the state mandating a particular form of speech over any professional or personal judgment by doctors. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the law and the Supreme Court, by refusing to hear an appeal, has left that in place. That means that the 2017 law will now go into effect after having been held up by the legal battle.
Kentucky has one abortion provider.