Judge extends restraining order against Texas rule that requires burial of aborted babies

Jardine Malado Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Whole Woman's Health founder Amy Hagstrom Miller speaks to members of the media during a media tour of the Whole Woman's Health clinic in San Antonio, Texas, in this file photo taken February 9, 2016. | Reuters/Darren Abate

A federal judge has issued a preliminary injunction that blocks a rule that requires abortion facilities in Texas to bury or cremate the remains of aborted babies.

The ruling issued by U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks extends a previous injunction against the state and orders both parties to proceed with a trial challenging the rule mandating the proper burial of aborted babies, Houston Chronicle reported. The injunction will remain until the case is settled.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton expressed his plans to appeal the ruling.

"Texas has chosen to dignify the life of the unborn by requiring the humane disposition of fetal remains," he said.

"Indeed, no longer content with merely ending the life of the unborn, the radical left now objects to even the humane treatment of fetal remains," he added.

The regulation was proposed by the Texas Department of State Health Services in July and was supposed to take effect on Dec. 19.

Lawyers for the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit on behalf of several abortion facilities against the state and won a temporary restraining order to halt the implementation of the rule.

Abortion providers have argued that the regulation does not benefit public health and that could lead to clinics closing because there are few vendors that are willing to provide cremation and burial services for aborted fetal remains.

"Anti-abortion attacks cannot and will not slow us down," Amy Hagstrom-Miller, president of Whole Woman's Health and the lead plaintiff in the case, said in a prepared statement, according to Dallas News.

"It is so important that our resiliency continues to blaze a path so that people in all communities are inspired to stand up and continue to fight back against political interference that attempts to regulate our lives," she added.

The current rules allow fetal remains to be incinerated, ground or disinfected and disposed of in a sanitary landfill or sewer system.

A top Texas Department of State Health Services official had testified that the remains of aborted babies would be buried in a mass grave. The Texas Conference of Catholic Bishops offered to provide the space for the remains in cemeteries across the state.