by Daniel Stefanski | Aug 18, 2024 | News
By Daniel Stefanski |
Arizona’s leading legislative Republicans are taking their defense of election integrity laws to the nation’s high court.
Last week, Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen and House Speaker Ben Toma filed an Emergency Application for Stay at the Supreme Court of the United States in RNC v. Mi Familia Vota. The brief was filed with Justice Elena Kagan in the ongoing dispute over HB 2492, which was passed in 2022.
According to the legislators’ brief, the relevant aspects of the law under challenge were the requirement for “elections officials to reject any state-form application that is not accompanied by documentary proof of citizenship,” and the provision “that voters who have not provided documentary proof of citizenship may not vote for president or by mail.”
In their brief, the lawmakers argue that “there is a reasonable probability that four justices would vote to grant review and a fair prospect that this Court would reverse,” and that “applicants will suffer irreparable harm absent a stay.”
The emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court follows a mixed – and rather unprecedented – ruling at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Last month, a panel on the court issued an order in support of the Arizona law’s requirement for proof of citizenship in state voter registrations. However, another panel on the same appeals court overturned this ruling, giving anyone in the state the ability to register to vote on a state form without first proving their citizenship.
After the shocking turn of events at the appeals court, Petersen had said, “This is just another example of why the radical Ninth Circuit is the most overturned circuit in the nation. They routinely engage in judicial warfare to carry out their extremist liberal agenda that’s contrary to the laws our citizens elected us to implement. We will seek assistance from the Supreme Court to ensure only American citizens are voting in our elections. If this principle is not followed, democracy as we know it, and as our Founding Fathers intended, is in jeopardy.”
RNC Chairman Michael Whatley stated: “Requiring proof of citizenship is common sense and fundamental to preserving the integrity of our elections – especially in our country’s most important presidential election. This application in the Supreme Court is pivotal to ensuring that Arizonans’ votes are not cancelled by non-citizens. Non-citizen voting is illegal and we are taking every possible action to ensure American elections are decided solely by Americans.”
Petersen and Toma make the case that “the improper injunction also harms the Arizona Legislature as an institution because it constitutes an extrinsic constraint on the Legislature’s lawmaking functions. The injunction thwarts the Legislature from disallowing individuals who have not proved their U.S. citizenship from participating in Arizona’s selection of its presidential electors or from using Arizona’s generous mail-in voting option.”
Daniel Stefanski is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Jun 17, 2024 | News
By Staff Reporter |
Attorney General Kris Mayes, a pro-choice Democrat, applauded the Supreme Court’s ruling on the controversial abortion drug, mifepristone.
Mayes issued a press release on Thursday in response to the Court’s ruling that the doctors and medical groups suing to roll back the FDA’s expansion of access to mifepristone had lack of standing, or the legal right to sue. The Supreme Court ruled that the doctors and medical groups couldn’t show that they would be harmed directly by the FDA’s mifepristone policies, specifically citing past rulings in which courts were determined to not be the forums for all “general complaints about the way in which government goes about its business.”
Although the High Court’s ruling hinged on the technicality of the plaintiffs’ identities, the attorney general depicted the ruling as supportive of mifepristone’s safety and efficacy.
“Millions of Americans have used Mifepristone safely and effectively for over two decades,” said Mayes. “By reversing the disastrous ruling by the Fifth Circuit, today’s decision will save lives and avoid widespread confusion among providers, distributors, pharmacies, and patients.”
Mayes also indicated that she would support those fights to expand abortion access. Arizona law currently restricts abortions to 15 weeks.
“I will never stop fighting against any attempts to restrict the rights of Arizonans to make their own healthcare decisions without interference from anti-abortion politicians and activists,” said Mayes.
The author of the Court’s opinion, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, admitted that the doctors and medical groups turned away for lack of standing had “sincere legal, moral, ideological, and policy objections” to mifepristone.
The FDA approved mifepristone over 20 years ago during the Clinton administration through a controversial fast-tracked approval process. The FDA reclassified pregnancy as a “serious or life-threatening illness,” with mifepristone therefore validated as a “meaningful therapeutic benefit.”
The Governmental Accountability Office issued a 2008 report highlighting the criticization of the FDA’s reclassification.
“Critics have argued that unwanted pregnancy should not be considered a serious or life-threatening illness,” read the report.
The FDA restrictions such as a risk evaluation mitigation strategy have faced rollback considerations on mifepristone as well.
The lawsuit at the center of this most recent Supreme Court ruling was prompted by the FDA’s announcement in 2021 that it would no longer enforce an initial in-person visit for practitioners to prescribe mifepristone.
Past court rulings and research have indicated that there have been thousands of adverse event cases from mifepristone.
The attorney general has been a vocal and repeat proponent of mifepristone.
Mayes joined an amicus brief last May advocating for the federal approval of the abortion drug. Since taking office earlier last year, Mayes encouraged major pharmacy chains to continue to offer mifepristone regardless of the ongoing or potential legal challenges.
The attorney general also launched a Reproductive Rights Unit tasked with advancing pathways for abortion, such as taking on legal challenges against medical providers and offering guidance to women on hiding their data when seeking abortion.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | May 15, 2024 | News
By Staff Reporter |
The Arizona Supreme Court has once again pumped the brakes on the state’s total abortion ban which dates back to pre-statehood days.
The order in the case, Planned Parenthood v. Hazelrigg, offered a temporary lifeboat for abortion supporters awaiting possible appeal. The court’s order, combined with the separate directive in Isaacson v. Arizona, means the abortion ban won’t go into effect until Sept. 26 of this year.
The Arizona Supreme Court rejected attempts to nullify the total abortion ban last month. That ruling, posted here, reflected the justices’ commitment to following their “limited constitutional role and duty to interpret the law as written” and deferring to the legislature.
“To date, our legislature has never affirmatively created a right to, or independently authorized, elective abortion,” ruled the court. “We defer, as we are constitutionally obligated to do, to the legislature’s judgment, which is accountable to, and thus reflects, the mutable will of our citizens.”
A version of the total abortion ban dated back to Arizona’s territorial days, to the final year of the Civil War: 1864. The law on the books, A.R.S. § 13-3603, prohibits abortions except when necessary to save the mother’s life.
The Supreme Court’s injunction only served to reduce the amount of time the ban would be enforced. The Arizona legislature passed a bill repealing the total abortion ban; Governor Katie Hobbes signed the bill earlier this month.
Currently, state law banning abortions after 15 weeks remains in effect.
An activist group hopes to end all restrictions on abortion in the state by enshrining abortion as a constitutional right.
Arizona for Abortion Access is gunning to secure a constitutional amendment question on the November ballot. Most of the group’s funding has come from out of state. The activists have until July 3 to gather just over 383,900 valid signatures for ballot referral.
Leftist organizations and Democrats, including Hobbs, are in full support of making abortion a constitutional right.
In response to her signing the bill repealing the total abortion ban, Hobbs’ administration rolled out a website advocating for unfettered abortion access, painting those opposed to abortion as “radical extremists.”
The website also depicted crisis pregnancy centers as inaccurate and deceptive operations, citing an Attorney General Kris Mayes webpage portraying these centers as predatory with personal health information and potentially even dangerous.
Mayes celebrated the court’s decision. She said that her office may use the time afforded them to petition the U.S. Supreme Court.
“I am grateful that the Arizona Supreme Court has stayed enforcement of the 1864 law and granted our motion to stay the mandate in this case for another 90 days,” said Mayes. “During this period, my office will consider the best legal course of action to take from here, including a potential petition for certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court.”
Apart from the additional stay granted, Mayes said that she opposed the Arizona Supreme Court’s ruling. Mayes indicated that abortion was a form of medical care.
“I continue to believe this case was wrongly decided, and there are issues that merit additional judicial review,” said Mayes. “I will do everything I can to ensure that doctors can provide medical care for their patients according to their best judgment, not the beliefs of the men elected to the territorial legislature 160 years ago.”
Former Attorney General Mark Brnovich, during his last months in office, backed the total abortion ban.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Daniel Stefanski | Jan 18, 2024 | News
By Daniel Stefanski |
Arizona’s leading legislative Republicans are cheering on the nation’s high court as it agreed to hear arguments in a significant case of interest to the state.
Earlier this month, the General Counsel for the Arizona House Republicans, Linley Wilson, announced that the Supreme Court of the United States had granted cert in City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson and Logan. Senate President Warren Petersen and House Speaker Ben Toma had filed an amicus brief at the Court in September 2023 in the matter concerning “three homeless individuals in Grants Pass (who) filed this lawsuit to try to stop local and state governments from combating the public safety threats, the public health dangers, and the inhumane conditions associated with these homeless encampments.”
The city had received unfavorable opinions from the federal courts at both the district and appeals (Ninth Circuit) levels, leading to the appeal to the nation’s high court.
In their brief, Petersen and Toma asserted that “the Legislature also has a pressing interest in homelessness because it confronts the realities of America’s homelessness crisis every day, including only a few blocks from the state capitol complex. Phoenix, Arizona, is home to one of the nation’s largest homeless encampments, commonly known as ‘The Zone.’ With hundreds of homeless residents, The Zone is a place of intense poverty, frequent crime (including multiple homicides), social instability, and poor living standards.”
The lawmakers also opined, “the Ninth Circuit decided it was better at making policy than elected state legislatures and city councils.” They argued the opinion from the Ninth Circuit “injects the federal courts into a policymaking area reserved for state and local lawmakers, entrenches a plainly incorrect and deeply damaging construction of the Eighth Amendment, and improperly interferes with state and local policymaking on the critically important issue of homelessness.”
Wilson previously pointed to a social media post from California Governor Gavin Newsom about the issue of federal courts inserting case law into “local efforts to clear street encampments,” stating, “This humanitarian crisis is not a partisan issue. The 9th Circuit’s opinions harm the homeless and the Legislature’s ability to craft effective policies.”
According to Amy Howe of SCOTUS Blog, this case will likely be heard before the Court in April.
Daniel Stefanski is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
by Corinne Murdock | Dec 13, 2023 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
On Tuesday, the Arizona Supreme Court held oral arguments on the state’s two conflicting abortion bans in the case Planned Parenthood et al v. Kristin Mayes/Hazelrigg.
The court is determining the fate of two conflicting laws: the total abortion ban outlawing all but life-saving abortions, in existence prior to Arizona achieving statehood with versions dating back to Arizona’s first laws as a territory in 1864, and the 2022 ban restricting abortions to 15 weeks’ gestation except in cases of medical emergency. The latter law was codified just months before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, who has refused to defend the pre-statehood ban, declared the day before the oral arguments that the ban would relegate Arizonans to a lesser, premodern society.
“Arizonans cannot be shoved back to the 1860s,” said Mayes.
Gov. Katie Hobbs encouraged voters to sign the ballot petition to legalize all abortion up to birth.
Stepping up to defend the pre-statehood ban in Mayes’ stead and first to speak during Tuesday’s oral arguments was Jake Warner, an attorney with the Scottsdale-based conservative Christian legal organization, Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF).
Warner proposed that a certain continuity exists between the pre-statehood ban, which the court referred to as the “territorial law,” and the 2022 ban limiting abortions to 15 weeks’ gestation.
Per Warner, the pre-statehood ban imposes a certain authority on the 2022 statute: all abortions prior to 15 weeks must be life-saving, and that abortions after 15 weeks must not only be life-saving but based on a medical emergency. Warner said that the language of the 2022 statute gave express direction to give deference to the pre-statehood ban.
Chief Justice Robert Brutinel and Vice Chief Justice Ann Timmer didn’t appear convinced of the argument. The pair indicated that physicians would be confused by the two statutes.
On the subject of ectopic pregnancies — an oft-referenced terminal condition in the abortion debate — Warner said that physicians wouldn’t be punished for their removal, since ectopic pregnancies constitute a medical emergency and their removal constitutes a life-saving measure.
Warner said that the 2022 restriction doesn’t repeal the pre-statehood abortion ban, because it created no new right to an abortion. Brutinel posited that the legislative intent with the newer law was to legalize abortion up to 15 weeks’ gestation. Warner countered that the legislature’s intent with its 2022 restriction was to ensure that it protected unborn life to the greatest extent possible.
Justice Clint Bolick questioned how the current law doesn’t conflict with the territorial ban, challenging the implication that something that wasn’t able to be prosecuted prior to Dobbs could now be prosecuted. Likewise, Brutinel said that a physician couldn’t have been prosecuted for conducting abortions under the new law. Warner responded that the language of the 2022 statute only purports to regulate terminations after 15 weeks, not before.
Counsel for Planned Parenthood Arizona, Andy Gaona, argued that the state legislature has displayed a progressive permissiveness when it comes to allowable abortions. Gaona stopped short of declaring the existence of a right to abortion at the outset of his arguments, but did declare, repeatedly, that abortion constituted a form of health care in closing.
“We have never maintained the right to an abortion exists,” said Gaona. “Abortion is health care. I’m not sure anyone has ever said that in this courtroom.”
Contrary to what Warner posited, Gaona argued that the 2022 law allows abortions up to 15 weeks without prosecutions, citing the previous court of appeals decision. Timmer asked whether the state legislature would need to declare a right to an abortion in order to permit that interpretation; Gaona responded that the legislature only needs to regulate criminal conduct to do so, arguing that criminal laws allow that which they don’t criminalize.
Bolick pointed out the 2022 law specifically referenced the territorial law in its construction:
“This act does not […] Repeal, by implication or otherwise, section 13-3603, Arizona Revised Statutes, or any other applicable state law regulating or restricting abortion,” stated the provision.
Gaona disagreed. He said that the court of appeals’ harmonization of the statutes didn’t repeal the pre-statehood law, even by removing prosecution, because the 2022 law now qualifies as the criminal prohibition for elective abortions. Gaona clarified that a physician couldn’t be prosecuted under the territorial statute, but could under the 2022 law if they conduct abortions after 15 weeks.
Gaona argued that a series of statutes that aren’t self-referential or fail to include language repealing an old statute qualify as an implied repeal. Gaona said that if the legislature’s intent was to resurrect the pre-statehood ban, it should’ve stated that clearly “and it clearly didn’t do that.”
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
