The Utah Supreme Court issued a ruling Thursday morning that upheld an injunction blocking enforcement of a 2020 trigger law that bans nearly all abortions across the state.
The 4-1 opinion from the Utah Supreme Court — which is comprised of three women and two men — affirmed a district court’s decision to enjoin the enforcement of the ban while Planned Parenthood of Utah and the state continue to litigate the constitutionality of the law.
Associate Chief Justice John Pearce authored the opinion, in which Justice Paige Petersen, Justice Diana Hagen and Justice Jill Pohlman joined.
Chief Justice Matthew Durrant, however, filed a dissenting opinion.
“The district court did not err when it concluded that (Planned Parenthood of Utah) had raised serious issues about the constitutionality of SB174,” Pearce wrote in the prevailing opinion. “The court did not abuse its discretion when it concluded that (Planned Parenthood of Utah) and its patients would be irreparably harmed without the injunction.”
“Likewise,” Pearce continues, “the court did not abuse its discretion when it concluded that the balance of harms tipped in favor of enjoining SB174 while parties litigate its constitutionality. Nor did the court act outside the bounds of its discretion when it concluded that the injunction would not be adverse to the public interest.”
Durrant, however, disagreed, arguing that Planned Parenthood lacked legal standing to request an injunction.
“While (Planned Parenthood) asserts that the enforcement of SB174 would cause it to suffer various economic and reputational injuries, none of the arguments in its complaint or request for a preliminary injunction rely on those injuries,” Durrant wrote in his dissenting opinion. (Planned Parenthood’s) arguments instead are premised on the harms SB174’s enforcement would cause to the rights and interests of PPAU’s patients. As the majority agrees, PPAU must show that it has standing to assert these claims on its patients’ behalf.”
While the district court concluded that Planned Parenthood “had standing to assert those claims” based on legal precedent establishing public interest, “the majority now affirms that decision on different grounds, holding that (Planned Parenthood) may assert these claims based on the concept of third-party standing … I respectfully disagree with both conclusions,” Durrant wrote.
Durrant also argued he would reject Planned Parenthood’s legal standing for an injunction for another reason — and he warned the court is risking a “dangerous expansion” of legal standing.
“The difficulties that (Planned Parenthood’s) patients face are genuine, but they are not that different from those faced by many others who wish to challenge a law’s constitutionality,” he wrote. “Appellate litigation is undoubtedly too expensive, inconvenient, and time-consuming. But if these factors alone are enough to justify the exercise of third-party standing, then we risk a dangerous expansion of that doctrine.”
The ruling immediately reverberated across the state. Democrats and Planned Parenthood representatives celebrated, while Republicans and anti-abortion advocates expressed disappointment. At least one Republican lawmaker said he will ask the Legislature to restrict Utah’s current abortion laws while court battles over the trigger law continue to play out.
‘Deep disappointment’ from Utah’s Republican leadersThe reaction from the Utah Supreme Court’s ruling was swift and scathing. It may also prompt Utah’s Republican-supermajority Legislature to hold a special session to further restrict Utah’s existing ban on abortions after 18 weeks of gestation.
Hours after the court issued its ruling, the sponsor of the trigger law, Sen. Dan McCay, R-Riverton, called the decision “extremely disappointing.” He also told reporters he plans to request a special legislative session by the end of the year to further restrict Utah’s current 18-week ban while the courts continue to hash out the more sweeping trigger law that would ban almost all abortions, with some exceptions for rape, incest and certain health issues.
“We’re going to look at making it much shorter,” he said, pointing to other states like Georgia, South Carolina, Florida and Iowa that ban abortions past about six weeks of gestation.
Other Republican leaders including Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, Senate President Stuart Adams and House Speaker Mike Schultz expressed deep disappointment in the ruling — though they did not immediately say whether they would indeed support McCay’s proposal or agree to call a special session.
“Over the next few weeks, we will discuss options with Sen. McCay, lawmakers and the governor to determine the next steps,” Adams said in a statement to Utah News Dispatch.
In response to questions about McCay’s request for a special session, Cox said in a statement to the Dispatch, “We are still reviewing the opinion and will be having discussions with the attorney general’s office and legislative leadership regarding every possible option to determine the best way to proceed to protect our most vulnerable.”
While “disappointed,” the governor said in a separate prepared statement, “We are hopeful that this decision will be a temporary setback and the laws will take effect following resolution of the case.” He also expressed gratitude for the state’s current 18-week ban, and added, “regardless of this outcome, our administration will continue to fight for all Utahns, including the unborn.”
Adams and Schultz, in a joint statement, went a step further, and accused the Utah Supreme Court of “undermining the constitutional authority of the Legislature” to enact laws.
Joint statement from @JStuartAdams and @mschultz_12 says they're "deeply disappointed" in Utah Supreme Court ruling upholding the injunction blocking enforcement of the trigger abortion law. #utpol
— Katie McKellar (@KatieMcKellar1) August 1, 2024
They say the court is "undermining the constitutional authority" of the #utleg pic.twitter.com/lySpYG0kpy
It’s the second ruling from the Utah Supreme Court in less than a month that Utah’s Republican legislative leaders have criticized. On July 10, the court handed a major win to plaintiffs in an anti-gerrymandering lawsuit — a decision that the Senate president and House speaker said “made a new law” for voter initiative power, “creating chaos and striking at the very heart of our republic.” Asked if legislators planned to act in any way to respond to the court’s ruling in the redistricting case, Adams told Utah News Dispatch they’d evaluate.
House Majority Whip Karianne Lisonbee, R-Clearfield, who has sponsored more recent anti-abortion legislative efforts, said it’s “deeply unfortunate that Utah’s strong pro-life law continues to be tied up in litigation more than two years after the Dobbs decision, resulting in deaths of thousands of unborn babies in our state.”
“We are consulting with our legal counsel on next steps for the litigation and are confident that we will ultimately prevail on the merits of the case.”
Democrats, Planned Parenthood celebrateMeanwhile, Democrats and Planned Parenthood representatives celebrated the decision, characterizing it as a win for women’s rights and reproductive health, and one that acted as a check to Utah’s Republican-controlled Legislature.
“Today’s decision means that our patients can continue to come to us, their trusted health care providers, to access abortion and other essential reproductive services right here in Utah,” said Kathryn Boyd, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Utah, said in a prepared statement. “While we celebrate this win, we know the fight is not over.”
Boyd said Planned Parenthood of Utah “looks forward to this unconstitutional law being permanently struck down so that we can continue to provide quality, affordable health care to Utahns, free from political interference.”
Utah House and Senate Democrats issued statements applauding the court’s decision.
“By preventing the immediate enforcement of SB174, the court has recognized the potential irreparable harm that this law could inflict on individuals seeking reproductive healthcare,” Senate Democrats said in a prepared statement. “We believe that healthcare decisions should be made by individuals in consultation with their healthcare providers, free from undue government interference. As this case moves forward, we hope that the lower courts will thoroughly consider the constitutional issues at stake and continue to protect the rights and well-being of Utahns.”
House Democrats said the ruling “ensures that essential healthcare services remain accessible.”
“Across the country, we have seen the devastating impact of aggressive abortion bans on women. Today, Utah avoids joining those statistics,” House Democrats said. “As the lower courts review this law, we urge our colleagues and the judiciary to continue considering the harmful impact this ban would have on the health and well-being of Utahns.”
Where does Utah’s abortion law stand now?
The ruling in Planned Parenthood of Utah’s lawsuit with the state of Utah is a major development in litigation that’s gone on for more than four years as the state’s Republican supermajority Legislature has sought to restrict access to abortion and “protect the unborn.” Their effort was emboldened by the U.S. Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022, which removed the federal constitutional right to an abortion.
In hopes that Roe v. Wade would eventually be overturned, the 2020 Utah Legislature passed SB174, known as a “trigger law” that banned nearly all abortions at any stage of pregnancy, except in certain circumstances. Those include cases of rape or incest, if the mother’s health is seriously at risk, or if two maternal fetal medicine physicians agree the fetus has a lethal birth defect or a severe brain abnormality.
When Roe v. Wade was indeed overturned in 2022, Utah’s trigger ban then became law — but only briefly before it was put on hold by a legal challenge from Planned Parenthood, which successfully sought an injunction from a district court.
Since then, abortions have remained legal in Utah up to 18 weeks of most pregnancies under a 2019 law. That status will remain while the lawsuit over the near-total trigger abortion ban winds its way through the courts.
Utah abortion statistics
Here are some facts about how often abortions take place in Utah, according to the most recent state data published by the Utah Department of Health and Human Services:
- In 2021, the total number of abortions performed in Utah was 3,127 and the number of abortions performed for Utah residents was 2,978.
- The highest ratio of abortions per 1,000 births in 2021 was in Salt Lake County, with a ratio of 109.7 abortions per 1,000 births. The lowest reported was in the state’s southwest health district with a ratio of 11.6 per 1,000 births.
- In 2021 the most common reasons for their abortion that patients reported were socio-economic (1,473), elective (925), or contraception failure (447). These three total 2,845 of the 2,976 reasons for women living in Utah to have an abortion.
- Almost half of abortions sought by Utah residents in 2021 were conducted between five and six weeks of gestation (1,310), while 834 were conducted between seven and eight weeks of gestation.
This story is breaking and will be updated.
Contributing: Alixel Cabrera
Utah News Dispatch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Utah News Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor McKenzie Romero for questions: info@utahnewsdispatch.com. Follow Utah News Dispatch on Facebook and X.
