Commentary: A Texas case shows how cruel and illusory the latest abortion-ban exceptions can be
A historic drama playing out in Texas ended Tuesday when the Texas Supreme Court held that Kate Cox, a woman 20 weeks pregnant with a fetus with trisomy 18, an almost always fatal abnormality, could not legally end her pregnancy in her home state.
Cox had taken the rare step of petitioning for a . She succeeded in the lower court, prompting Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to appeal and threaten local hospitals and Cox’s doctor with prosecution if she. The Texas Supreme Court quickly handed down its ruling: State law did not make an exception for fatal fetal abnormalities and Cox was not near enough to death or permanent impairment of a major bodily function to qualify for an exemption. She traveled out of state to .
