New Mexico city sues governor to maintain its ‘sanctuary metropolis for the unborn’ ordinance

New Mexico is quickly changing into an abortion vacation spot beneath Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, however her efforts are assembly with stiff resistance from pro-life New Mexicans residing alongside the Texas border.

The city of Eunice, New Mexico, inhabitants 2,997, filed a lawsuit in opposition to a newly signed invoice that stops localities from banning abortion inside their limits after a spate of communities voted to declare themselves sanctuary cities for the unborn.

“It offers me nice honor to say right here in our nation’s capital: Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and Legal professional Basic Raul Torrez, we are going to see you in court docket,” mentioned Eunice Mayor Billy Hobbs at a Monday press convention in entrance of the U.S. Supreme Courtroom.

The Eunice Metropolis Council voted unanimously at a Jan. 23 assembly to declare itself a “sanctuary metropolis for the unborn,” the identical day that Mr. Torrez sued the cities of Hobbs and Clovis, in addition to Lea and Roosevelt counties, for beforehand approving sanctuary ordinances.

“This isn’t Texas,” Mr. Torrez mentioned in a press launch then. “Our State Structure doesn’t enable cities, counties or personal residents to limit girls’s reproductive rights. Right this moment’s motion ought to ship a powerful message that my Workplace will use each out there instrument to swiftly and decisively uphold particular person liberties in opposition to unconstitutional overreach.”

The Democrat-controlled legislature adopted up final month by passing Home Invoice 7 to override the native abortion bans, however the grievance filed in state court docket argues that the measure is trumped by the Comstock Act, the 150-year-old federal legislation barring the mailing of abortion-inducing medication and paraphernalia.

“We have already got a de facto federal abortion ban right here in America, and each single abortion business in New Mexico is in violation of those federal abortion statutes,” mentioned Republican state Sen. David Gallegos on the Monday announcement.

He added: “Madam Governor, take into account your self Comstocked.”

The Governor of New Mexico and Legal professional Basic of New Mexico have been sued. The lawsuit could be learn right here. #therighttolife #thefightforlife #fromconceptiontillnaturaldeath #unbornlivesmatter #loveoneanother #COMSTOCKEDhttps://t.co/dCM4aSlGEM

— Mark Lee Dickson (@MarkLeeDickson) April 17, 2023

The Eunice lawsuit, which was filed Monday in New Mexico’s fifth Judicial District Courtroom for Lea County, names as defendants the governor and legal professional normal of their official capacities.

New Mexico localities started taking motion final yr as Entire Girls’s Well being closed its Texas clinics and commenced scouting places in southeastern New Mexico.

After Hobbs and Clovis permitted the sanctuary ordinances, the corporate opted to arrange store in left-leaning Albuquerque, about 200 miles from the Texas border. Hobbs, Clovis and Eunice all lie 10 miles or much less from the sting of the Lone Star State.

Lori Bova, Proper to Lifetime of Lea County spokesperson, accused Mr. Torrez of taking “punitive motion” with the lawsuits.

“Our state legislature additionally handed a invoice that was signed into legislation by our governor making an attempt to render the native ordinances moot,” Ms.  Bova mentioned. “Our state leaders appear to wield endless energy, however I’ll let you know one factor at this time: They don’t have the ability to disregard federal legislation.”

Since 2019, 65 cities and two counties have handed “sanctuary metropolis for the unborn” measures, however not like these in different states, the New Mexico ordinances particularly point out the Comstock Act, mentioned Mark Lee Dickson, director of Proper to Lifetime of East Texas.

“We realized early on we couldn’t go an ordinance in New Mexico like those which had been handed in Texas,” mentioned Mr. Dickson, founding father of the sanctuary motion. “We couldn’t go an specific abortion ban in New Mexico as a result of the New Mexico legislature was possible going to ban cities from passing these sorts of abortion bans.”

Due to this fact, he tailored.

“So what did we do? We devised a brand new solution to go sanctuary metropolis for the unborn ordinances, and that was by counting on federal statutes which had been handed by Congress in 1873,” Mr. Dickson mentioned.

The Comstock Act was nullified by the Supreme Courtroom’s 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade, which then itself was undone by the excessive court docket’s June 24 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Girls’s Well being Group.

The Justice Division has largely dismissed the Comstock Act, arguing in a December authorized opinion that the 2 medication used within the abortion protocol produce other functions, and that the sender should know that they are going to be used illegally for the legislation to use.

Whereas the Biden administration might not take the Comstock Act significantly, the identical can’t be mentioned of the federal judiciary.

U.S. District Decide Matthew Kacsmaryk mentioned in his April 7 preliminary injunction suspending the Meals and Drug Administration’s approval of mifepristone that the “plain textual content of the Comstock Act controls.”

The fifth U.S. Circuit Courtroom of Appeals backed him up days later.

“We hesitate to seek out ‘clear and manifest’ intention to repeal a 150-year-old statute that Congress has in any other case repeatedly declined to change within the far reaches of a single part of the cavernous FDA [Amendments Act],” mentioned the appeals court docket in its April 12 ruling.

New Mexico, although, is roofed by the tenth  U.S. Circuit Courtroom of Appeals.

Ms. Lujan Grisham has rolled out the welcome mat for clinics post-Roe, pledging $10 million for a brand new abortion facility in Dona Ana County and signing laws to guard suppliers from out-of-state prosecutions.

The Reproductive and Gender-Affirming Well being Care Act, which she signed March 16, “prohibits public our bodies, together with native municipalities, from denying, limiting, or discriminating in opposition to a person’s proper to make use of or refuse reproductive well being care or well being care associated to gender.”

New Mexico has no gestational limits on abortion, that means the process is authorized all through being pregnant, whereas Texas bans most abortions.

“New Mexicans in each nook of our state deserve protections for his or her bodily autonomy and proper to well being care,” mentioned Ms. Lujan Grisham in her signing assertion. “I’m grateful for the laborious work of the Legislature and neighborhood companions in getting this vital laws throughout the end line.”