New law included a requirement that providers’ websites link to a state site
By John Hanna
Associated Press
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The chief federal judge in Kansas refused Sunday to temporarily block parts of a new state abortion law, including a requirement that providers’ websites link to a state site with information they dispute.
But U.S. District Judge Kathryn Vratil’s ruling Sunday in a lawsuit filed by Planned Parenthood came after a state judge ruled Friday in a separate challenge that Kansas couldn’t enforce the website requirement for now. Vratil noted the previous ruling, in a case filed by two doctors, in concluding that Planned Parenthood would not suffer irreparable harm if she didn’t do the same. The rule was to take effect Monday.
Under the law, a provider’s home page will have to provide a link to a Kansas Department of Health and Environment site on abortion and fetal development and contain a statement that the state’s information is “objective” and “scientifically accurate.” Abortion providers object because the state’s information says that a fetus can feel pain by the 20th week of pregnancy, while the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has said there’s no evidence for such an assertion.
Supporters of the new requirement contend it ensures that women who are considering abortions have access to multiple sources of information about fetal development, the risks of abortion and alternatives to it.
“Women have a right to know that information,” said Mary Kay Culp, executive director of Kansans for Life, the most influential anti-abortion group at the Kansas Statehouse.
She said of abortion providers: “They scream, ‘The sky is falling,’ no matter how reasonable the bill is.”
The website rule is part of a sweeping law approved by Kansas legislators this year that also bans sex-selection abortions, blocks tax breaks for providers, prohibits providers from furnishing materials or instructors for public schools’ classes and declares as a general policy that life begins “at fertilization.” Planned Parenthood didn’t challenge those parts of the law.
Abortion providers contend requiring them to declare that the state provides accurate and objective information on its website about abortion and fetal development violates their free-speech rights. Planned Parenthood is pursuing its federal lawsuit on behalf of a clinic in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park that performs abortions and the clinic’s medical director.
Peter Brownlie, president and chief executive officer of Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri, which operates the Overland Park clinic, declined to comment, saying his organization had not had time to examine Vratil’s ruling.
Planned Parenthood had asked Vratil to keep the state from enforcing the website requirement while its lawsuit proceeds through the courts.
It also challenged a requirement that before doctors can perform abortions, patients must receive information containing a statement about the fetus’ ability to feel pain. Vratil concluded that “at this point in the litigation,” the objectivity of the information is “an unresolved question of fact.”
Kansas already restricts abortions after the 20th week following fertilization, with the law declaring “there is substantial medical evidence” that a fetus can feel pain by then. Legislators who enacted those restrictions said they relied on research from numerous studies.
