SCOTUS NEWS
Court schedules abortion pill case for March argument session
By Amy Howe
on Jan 29, 2024 at 1:47 pm
The Supreme Court will hear oral argument on Mar. 26 in the battle over access to a drug used in medication abortions, which account for over half of all abortions performed in the United States. The justices on Monday morning released
the calendar for their March argument sitting, which begins on Mar. 18 and ends on Mar. 27.
The argument in Food and Drug Administration v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine and Danco Laboratories v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, which will be heard together, headlines the March calendar. It is the first time since the courts 2022 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization, overturning the constitutional right to an abortion, that the justices will weigh in on the issue of abortion.
The drug at the center of the case, mifepristone, is half of a two-drug protocol used to end pregnancies in their early stages. A group of doctors and medical groups opposed to abortion challenged the FDAs approval of the drug last year, arguing that the protocol is unsafe. ... In August, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit turned down the challengers request to revoke the FDAs initial approval of the drug in 2000, ruling that the lawsuit came too late, but it rolled back later actions by the FDA that increased access to the drug, such as allowing it to be used later in pregnancy. The drug, however, remains widely available as a result of
a temporary order issued earlier in 2023 by the Supreme Court.
The FDA and Danco, which manufactures mifepristone, came to the Supreme Court last year, asking the justices to review the 5th Circuits decision, which they agreed in December to do.
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Here is the full list of cases scheduled for oral argument in March, along with a brief summary of the question presented in each:
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Recommended Citation: Amy Howe,
Court schedules abortion pill case for March argument session, SCOTUSblog (Jan. 29, 2024, 1:47 PM),
https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/01/court-schedules-abortion-pill-case-for-march-argument-session/