Texas faces lawsuit filed by the Justice Department on Tuesday over its new state law banning the majority of abortions.
The department, which filed the suit in federal court in Texas, said that the law is “in open defiance of the Constitution”. The suit appeals to a federal judge to consider the law’s invalidity “to enjoin its enforcement, and to protect the rights that Texas has violated.”
“The act is clearly unconstitutional under long-standing Supreme Court precedent,” said Attorney General Merrick Garland as he announced the suit in a press conference.
According to the Justice Department, the law illegally invades women’s constitutional rights and is in defiance of the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution.
He said that federal officials also worry that the same law will be pushed by other states and would “deprive their citizens of their constitutional rights.”
“It is settled constitutional law that ‘a State may not prohibit any woman from making the ultimate decision to terminate her pregnancy before viability,’” the lawsuit reads. “But Texas has done just that.”
Called as the SB8, the new Texas law bans abortions when cardiac movement can be monitored by medical professionals.
While other states were hindered by the court from implementing the same ban, the law in Texas had a notable difference since private citizens were entrusted with its enforcement through civil lawsuits.
The Justice Department is facing piling pressure from both the White House and the Congress, AP News reported.
President Joe Biden has once labeled the law as “almost un-American” while Democrats in the Congress push actions from Garland, who, earlier this week, promised that the Justice Department will interfere to put the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act into enforcement.
