AUSTIN, Texas — A new ruling from the Texas Supreme Court creates questions about one group's fight against the state's abortion restrictions.
Friday’s ruling concerns the fight over the "Texas Heartbeat Act," or SB 8, which passed in 2021. It banned abortions after about six weeks of gestation and also let private citizens sue someone who provides or helps someone get the procedure in Texas.
Planned Parenthood and other reproductive rights organizations sued over it.
Friday's ruling questions the validity of that lawsuit and kicks this case back to a lower court.
This specific lawsuit only deals with the Heartbeat Act. It does not deal with the Texas law that bans all abortions, except in cases where a mother's life or major bodily function is in danger.
The lawsuit argues Texas Right to Life has organized efforts to sue people it believes is violating the Heartbeat Act. In December 2021, a Travis County judge ruled the law was unconstitutional, but did not stop it from being enforced. An effort by Texas Right to Life to throw out the lawsuit was also dismissed.
An appeal to that ruling was upheld by a state court. But the Texas Supreme Court ruled on Friday the lower courts did not consider if the plaintiffs had standing to file the lawsuit before dismissing Texas Right to Life’s effort to throw out the case. The ruling concerns the Texas Citizens Participation Act (TCPA), which shields Texans from lawsuits aiming to suppress their First Amendment Rights.
"If the plaintiffs lack standing, the court should not address the TCPA motion at all," the unanimous Texas Supreme Court ruling said. "Instead, it should vacate the trial court’s orders and dismiss the case without any remand to the trial court. If the court concludes that the case is justiciable—because the plaintiffs had standing and because there is no other jurisdictional defect—it should do what it prematurely did last time: address the merits of the motion to dismiss, beginning with the applicability of the TCPA to the plaintiffs’ claims."