Michael Hiltzik: Ironic justice: Laws passed to gut Obamacare are now being used to protect abortion rights

The law of unintended consequences is never as powerful as when those consequences originate from a hasty, ill-considered action.

Conservative forces in Ohio and Wyoming are learning that the hard way.

In those states, judges have blocked antiabortion laws enacted in the wake of the Supreme Court's egregious Dobbs decision overturning federal abortion rights by citing partisan laws enacted to undermine the Affordable Care Act in 2011 and 2012.

Those anti-Obamacare laws codified their citizens' right to choose their own health insurance and health care.

Their goal was to counteract the ACA's mandate that individuals carry health insurance. The laws were written expansively, however, to incorporate guarantees of unrestricted access to health care.

"The laws were passed saying people have a health care choice," says David S. Cohen, an expert on abortion law