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Undocumented immigrant teen has abortion ending weeks-long court battle

October 26, 2017 by  
Filed under Latest Lingerie News

An undocumented teen in federal custody ended her pregnancy Wednesday morning less than 24 hours after a judge’s order forced the government to allow the 17-year-old to be promptly transferred to an abortion facility.

The announcement from the teenager’s attorneys puts an end to case that raised difficult political questions and highlighted the Trump administration’s new policy of refusing to “facilitate” abortions for unaccompanied minors.

The teenager, identified only as Jane Doe in court papers, is being held in Texas for illegally entering the country and was nearly 16 weeks pregnant. Texas law bans most abortions after 20 weeks.

“Justice prevailed today for Jane Doe. But make no mistake about it, the administration’s efforts to interfere in women’s decisions won’t stop with Jane,” said Brigitte Amiri, senior staff attorney with the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project who represented the teen.

The teenager’s procedure came after a weeks-long legal battle that moved swiftly through the courts, with judges issuing contradictory rulings.

On Tuesday, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit took the unusual step of reversing a three-judge panel of the same court without first holding oral argument. The panel decision would have postponed the abortion.

Instead, the D.C. Circuit’s 6-3 ruling sent the case back to a judge, who hours later ordered the government to “promptly and without delay” transport the teen to a Texas abortion provider.

In a statement provided Wednesday by the ACLU, the teenager said she knew immediately after learning of her pregnancy after her border crossing that she was “not ready to be a parent.”

The government-funded shelter, her statement said, would not allow her to get an abortion.

“Instead, they made me see a doctor that tried to convince me not to abort and to look at sonograms. People I don’t even know are trying to make me change my mind. I made my decision and that is between me and God. Through all of this, I have never changed my mind.”

It was not immediately clear where the abortion was performed, but her attorneys said last week that she had already received the counseling Texas law requires at least 24 hours in advance of an abortion.

The D.C. Circuit’s ruling on Tuesday was opposed by the court’s three active judges nominated to the bench by Republican presidents. Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh said the majority has “badly erred” and created a new right for undocumented immigrant minors in custody to “immediate abortion on demand.”

Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson went further in a separate dissent finding the undocumented teenager has no constitutional right to an elective abortion. “To conclude otherwise rewards lawlessness and erases the fundamental difference between citizenship and illegal presence in our country,” she wrote.

Lawyers for the undocumented teenager asked the full appeals court to rehear her case after a divided panel gave the Department of Health and Human Services until Oct. 31 to find a sponsor to take custody of the girl.

Brigitte Amiri, the teen’s American Civil Liberties Union lawyer, said the girl’s court-appointed guardian was thrilled to tell her that she could terminate her pregnancy after the full appeals court order.

“We should never have had to go all the way to a full appellate court to say what we know is the law: that the government can’t ban abortion for anybody,” Amiri said.

Democratic lawmakers have demanded answers from HHS Acting Secretary Eric Hargan about why the Trump administration quietly changed federal policy to deny access to abortions for minors in custody.

Scott Lloyd, director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the HHS agency that oversees the minors, said in a March email that government-funded shelters caring for the minors “should not be supporting abortion services pre or post-release; only pregnancy services and life-affirming options counseling.”

Lawyers for the teenager argued the government was violating the girl’s constitutional right to obtain an abortion. The teenager has already received permission from a Texas judge to bypass the state’s parental consent requirement and terminate her pregnancy.

“Her capacity to make the decision about what is in her best interests by herself was approved by a Texas court,” Millett wrote Tuesday.

Millett and five other judges nominated to the bench by Democratic presidents voted to reinstate the lower court’s initial order allowing the abortion. Judge Cornelia T. L. Pillard was recused. Her spouse is the ACLU’s legal director.

In last week’s 2-1 decision, Kavanaugh and Henderson gave HHS until next week to find a sponsor to take custody of the girl. That would have allowed her to be released and to seek the abortion without government involvement.

Government lawyers had said prospective sponsors have inquired about the teenager. But the girl’s lawyers on Sunday filed a sworn statement from the former ORR director during the Obama administration who described the lengthy process of vetting sponsors.

In his dissent Tuesday, Kavanaugh said the government should be able to “expeditiously transfer” the teenager to a sponsor — typically a relative or friend — who could help her make a major life decision. The government, Kavanaugh wrote, “is merely seeking to place the minor in a better place when deciding whether to have an abortion.”

Millett disputed the idea that the sponsorship process would have gone quickly.

“There is nothing expeditious about the prolonged and complete barrier to [the teenager’s] exercise of her right to terminate her pregnancy that the panel order allowed the government to perpetuate.”

Government officials have also said they are not blocking the girl from getting an abortion because she could voluntarily return to her home country. The government, however, acknowledged that abortion is illegal in the girl’s home country, which is not identified in filings.

Matt Zapotosky and Robert Barnes contributed to this report.

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