File: An employee looks through patients files at the Hope Medical Group for Women in Shreveport, Louisiana, April 19, 2022. (Photo by FRANCOIS PICARD/AFP via Getty Images) BATON ROUGE, La. - Abortion clinics in Louisiana can continue operating while a lawsuit challenging the state’s near total ban on abortions is resolved, a state judge ruled Thursday.The preliminary injunction issued by state district judge Donald Johnson in Baton Rouge is the latest development amid a flurry of court challenges to state "trigger" laws that were crafted in anticipation of the U.S.
Supreme Court overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that established abortion rights, which it did June 24.For weeks, access to abortion has been flickering in Louisiana where there are three clinics.
A statewide abortion ban has taken effect twice and been blocked twice since the Supreme Court’s ruling in June. Johnson had entered a temporary hold on enforcement July 11, pending arguments in the case that were heard Monday.Johnson's new ruling allows clinics to continue providing abortion procedures while a lawsuit filed by a north Louisiana abortion clinic and others continues.