AUSTIN — A federal judge will hear closing arguments Wednesday in a case set to determine the immediate future of a contentious law requiring abortion providers to gain admitting privileges at local hospitals and restricting the use of pregnancy-ending drugs.
Lawyers for Planned Parenthood and two other advocacy groups challenging elements of Texas' new abortion law put their final witnesses on the stand Tuesday. Attorney General Greg Abbott's legal team did not call a single witness, relying over the course of the last two days on written testimony and attempts to pick apart statements laid out by abortion-rights witnesses.
That sets the stage Wednesday morning for both sides, each granted a full hour for closing arguments, to make their final case on the merits of the law in front of U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel.
"I don't want a lot of rambling," said Yeakel, who is set to issue a ruling by Monday. "What I want is focused argument on this statute and why it lives or dies under the law as it exists at this time."
In the short run, Yeakel's ruling will determine whether Texas can start next week implementing two elements of an abortion package that some have deemed one of the most restrictive in the nation.
The law's constitutionality will be decided by a higher court - something even Yeakel acknowledged Monday. Both sides are actively girding for the next step in what promises to be a lengthy court battle: an appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and possibly the U.S. Supreme Court.
The law was passed in July amid the backdrop of massive protests on both sides of the issue at the state Capitol. Beginning next Tuesday, it requires abortion doctors to have admitting privileges within 30 miles of the clinic and that they follow strict instructions for pill-induced medical abortions.
Planned Parenthood last month sued to block both elements of the law.
Clinics could close
Tuesday capped consecutive days of witness testimony from the advocacy groups, including a Planned Parenthood doctor, a clinic owner and a demographer. Collectively, they testified the new law will harm women by requiring clinics across the state to shutter, will leave more than 20,000 Texas women without access to safe abortions, and they spoke on the difficulty of recruiting new doctors to perform the procedure.
Amy Hagstrom Miller, founder and CEO of Whole Woman's Health, which operates abortion clinics in five Texas cities, testified that aside from one doctor in Beaumont, she's been unable to get hospitals to grant admitting privileges to her team of physicians.
As a result, three of her clinics will be forced to close if the new laws take effect next week.
"If I don't have women coming in for services, I don't have any revenue," Miller said, noting that a total of 13 clinics in Texas are slated to shutter within a week if the law is upheld.
State lawyers have said that the abortion-rights groups can't predict the laws impact until it is fully implemented, calling the projections of clinics closures across the state as a result of the law "hearsay anecdotes."
On Tuesday, Assistant Solicitor General Arthur D'Andrea dug into financial figures at Miller's business, tallying abortion revenues at four of her clinics in 2012 at $3.7 million. He then called Miller and other abortion clinic owners "business people who employ a bunch of doctors."
Put on the defensive
State lawyers also spent a good chunk of time trying to discredit a study from Joseph Potter, a University of Texas demographer whose project concluded some 22,000 Texas women annually will lose access to the procedure under the new law.
Potter spent much time on the defensive as Abbott's team of lawyers tried to pry details about the study's methodology and conclusions. Pressed by Deputy Attorney General John Scott, Potter refused to identify the two Bexar County clinics his study had pegged for closure.
Scott then asked Yeakel to compel Potter to answer, but the judge instead made it clear that specificity is important if the advocacy groups want their point to resonate.
"I find his testimony not as persuasive if we're talking generally about 'well we think there will be two clinics out there,' " Yeakel said, referencing Potter's testimony. "I can tell you the court would find it helpful if there have been specified, identified institutions or facilities that would close if the act took effect as opposed to a general statement."
With that message, lawyers representing the advocacy groups agreed to hand over data that abortion clinics provided for the study and Potter's notes.
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