A Planned Parenthood Clinic in downtown Milwaukee. (Photo | Isiah Holmes)
The administration of Gov. Tony Evers filed a motion Wednesday in one of the two high-profile abortion cases before the Wisconsin Supreme Court that argues a “near-total” abortion ban is unconstitutional and asked to join the lawsuit.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled this month that it will accept the two cases — Kaul v. Urmanski, which asks whether the state’s 1849 law widely seen as banning abortion actually does so, and Planned Parenthood v. Urmanski, which asks whether abortion is a right protected by the state Constitutions — concurrently. The cases will be instructive in clarifying where state law stands on abortion, which was effectively eliminated in the state following the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision in 2022 until a Dane County judge ruled last year that the 1849 law doesn’t apply to abortion.
Evers said in a statement that the fight to restore the protections of Roe and protect “safe, legal abortion” access is important with the “looming Republican threats of enacting a national abortion ban and rolling back access to birth control and emergency contraception.”
“Every Wisconsinite should have access to the healthcare they need when they need it, and they should be able to make their own reproductive healthcare decisions without interference from politicians who know nothing about their faith, family, or circumstances,” Evers continued.
Attorney General Josh Kaul, who filed the first case in 2022, said in a statement that the Wisconsin Department of Justice is looking to intervene in the Planned Parenthood case to “help establish that the Wisconsin Constitution protects access to safe and legal abortion and does not permit the state legislature to ban nearly all abortions. The government should not be able to control critical reproductive health decisions.”
The filing argues that the state plaintiffs in the Kaul case should be allowed to intervene because the questions asked “are so closely connected that how each case is litigated or decided could directly impact the other.” It says the Kaul plaintiffs agree with the Planned Parenthood plaintiffs and want the chance to “fully argue why the Wisconsin Constitution would prohibit” a near-total abortion ban.
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