Two of the country’s strictest abortion laws were blocked by federal judges Monday, according to The Hill.
A federal court in Georgia on Monday permanently blocked the state’s “heartbeat” law that banned physicians from performing an abortion once a fetus’s “heartbeat” can be detected — usually about six weeks into a pregnancy and before many women know they’re pregnant.
Meanwhile, a federal judge in Tennessee issued a temporary restraining order to block a law that would have essentially banned abortion at nearly every stage of pregnancy, less than an hour after Gov. Bill Lee (R) signed it Monday morning.
In Georgia, District Judge Steve C. Jones ruled that the law violated a woman’s constitutional right to access to abortion, as established by the Supreme Court ruling in Roe v. Wade, the landmark ruling that established a woman’s right to abortion, The Hill reported Monday.
A woman has a “constitutional liberty … to have some freedom to terminate her pregnancy,” Jones wrote.
Jones last year temporarily blocked the law from going into effect while the case played out in court. It was set to take effect on Jan. 1.
The state is expected to appeal.
In Tennessee, District Court Judge William Campbell, Jr. issued a temporary restraining order effective until July 27.
The Hill reported abortion rights groups Planned Parenthood, Center for Reproductive Rights and the American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit in June after the bill passed the state Senate in an early morning vote.