The Supreme Court has upheld the constitutional right to abortion today, after rejecting the state of Louisiana's attempts to limit access to the procedure for the second time in four years.
Chief Justice, John Roberts, stood with liberal justices on the Supreme Court on Monday to block the controversial law, which critics claimed would close nearly every clinic in the state.
This move strikes down a 2014 Louisiana law that required physicians performing abortions at clinics to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.
The 5-4 ruling is a win for pro-choicers who argued that the law was a thinly veiled attempt to restrict access to abortions. The majority opinion, presented by Justice Stephen Breyer, noted that the majority "consequently hold that the Louisiana statute is unconstitutional."
"The evidence also shows that opposition to abortion played a significant role in some hospitals' decisions to deny admitting privileges," he continued, before adding that the law in question was identical to the one the court considered and denounced in the state of Texas back in 2016.
Certainly, Monday's case, called June Medical Services v. Russo, is very similar to the 2016 Texas case, Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt that resulted in half of the state's clinics closing. Ultimately, the Supreme Court struck down the law, which had already gone into effect.
In his opinion striking down the Lousiana Law, Breyer wrote that the court held that "[u]nnecessary health regulations that have the purpose or effect of presenting a substantial obstacle to a woman seeking an abortion impose an undue burden on the right" and are, therefore, "constitutionally invalid".
Lousiana's law, Breyer continued is "almost word-for-word identical to Texas’ admitting-privileges", adding that the District Court’s findings in the Louisiana case "mirror those made in Whole Woman’s Health in every relevant respect and require the same result."
Breyer was joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan, while Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh sided with the dissent.
Per CNN, this ruling continues a trend of Roberts siding with liberals in a number of major cases. According to the publication, he previously upheld the program allowing undocumented immigrants who came into the country as children to remain indefinitely, and supported anti-discrimination protection to LGBTQ workers.