WASHINGTON – Associate Justice Samuel Alito on Wednesday extended an administrative stay in the high-profile challenges the abortion pill mifepristone, halting any action on those cases until the end of the week.
At issue are restrictions on access to mifepristone that were set to take effect at midnight on Wednesday, including a requirement that Americans sit for in-person visits with doctors and a prohibition on the drug being dispensed through the mail.
Now those restrictions will continue to be on hold until 11:59 p.m. Friday. The latest order from Alito does not signal which way the court is leaning but does temporarily delay restrictions abortion rights advocates warned could limit availability of the drug.
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The latest legal drama over abortion began earlier this month when a pair of federal court rulings on April 7 plunged the fate of mifepristone into uncertainty. One of those rulings, from U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, had the effect of invalidating the FDA’s 23-year-old approval for the drug.
Days later, a federal appeals court in Louisiana sided with the Biden administration on the drug’s approval but allowed to stand the parts of Kacsmaryk’s ruling that halted efforts to expand access to the drug.
