Pennsylvania Supreme Court Takes Aim at Politics of Cruelty
The justices suggested that a prohibition on using Medicaid funding for abortions violated the state's Equal Rights Amendment.
The fight continues.
Photographer: Jill Connelly/Bloomberg
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court delivered a victory to abortion-rights advocates in directing a lower court to consider a challenge to the state’s 1982 prohibition on Medicaid funding for abortions in cases other than rape and incest. The 3-2 decision was widely viewed as an invitation to declare the ban a violation of the state’s Equal Rights Amendment.
The ruling followed news that Texas, one of 14 Republican-led states where abortion is effectively banned, leads the nation in pregnancies resulting from rape. In a comment that still seems too stupid to be real, Texas Governor Greg Abbott in 2021 dismissed concerns about women who might be forced to bring a rapist’s fetus to term by saying that the state would “eliminate rapists from the streets of Texas.” After more than 26,000 pregnancies resulted from rape, it appears that the rape-be-gone genie failed to grant the governor's wish.