A Missouri state representative introduced legislation that would permit people to sue anyone they suspect of assisting a resident in pursuing abortion in another state. Republican state Rep. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, who was behind the bill, told The Washington Post that she spoke to "anyone who would listen” about legal strategies for thwarting Missourians from seeking abortions in other states.
“If your neighboring state doesn’t have pro-life protections, it minimizes the ability to protect the unborn in your state,” Coleman, who is currently running for the Missouri Senate, told the Post.
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In Idaho, a bill seeking to ban gender-affirming care for youth would have made it a felony to help a child access the care sought after outside the state. The state Senate refused to take up the bill, though it was passed by the House. Legal experts have argued that such bills are unconstitutional and have little chance of withstanding legal challenges.
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“States are free to have their own rules, and those rules differ from state to state,” Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas School of Law, told NPR. “But the notion that a state can tell its citizens what they could do, not just within but without their borders, really is anathema to how we think of our constitutional system.” Texas’ SB 8 has spurred similar bills. The Texas law, which took effect in September, enabled private citizens to bring civil suits against anyone who helps a pregnant person in Texas get an abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy.
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On Monday, Idaho passed an anti-abortion bill that mirrors the Texas law prohibiting abortions after about six weeks, when fetal cardiac activity is detected. The Texas law was the first of its kind to put the onus of abortion-related enforcement in the hands of citizens.
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In January, The U.S. Supreme Court refused for the third time to put the Texas law on hold as appeals work their way through federal courts. Vladeck, who describes SB 8 as “patently unconstitutional under current law,” told NPR the Supreme Court’s decision to allow it to stand “has enabled and incentivized” state-level GOP legislators. He said the Supreme Court likely would push back harder on legislation aiming to punish people for going out of state to do things legal there.
“The court will let states get away with doing lots of ridiculous stuff to their own residents inside their state borders,” Vladeck told NPR before adding that right-to-travel protections will help the justices “strike down laws that make it unlawful to travel out of state for the same behavior. “There is a fair amount of precedent that would support that.”
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