A North Dakota judge has struck down the state's abortion ban, ruling that the state constitution protects a woman's right to the procedure until the fetus is viable.
Judge Bruce Romanik said in his ruling that the ban was too vague and therefore “unconstitutionally invalid.” He also argued that the laws “at issue here violate a woman’s fundamental right to reproductive autonomy and are not intended solely to promote women’s health or protect unborn human life.”
The state's Republican-led attorney general has vowed to appeal the judge's ruling.
North Dakota's abortion ban made abortion possible in cases of rape and incest, if the mother was less than six weeks pregnant, or if the pregnancy posed a risk to the mother's health.
State Representative Carla Rose Hanson said in a statement that the abortion law is “particularly cruel to victims of sexual assault because it provides an exception for victims of rape and incest, but only for six weeks, before most women know they are pregnant.”
Romanik's decision is not expected to have an immediate impact on North Dakota women's ability to obtain abortions within the state, as there are currently no medical facilities in the state that offer the procedure.
The state's only abortion provider, Red River Women's Clinic, moved out of state in 2022 after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which allowed individual states to ban abortion. It moved to nearby Moorhead, Minnesota.
Clinic Director Tammy Kromenacker told The Associated Press the clinic has no immediate plans to return to North Dakota, but added that the judge's ruling “gives us hope.”
State Senator Janne Myrdal said North Dakota Monitor that “the losers today are unborn children and their mothers and fathers, not some activists. There are no winners in this.” Myrdal sponsored the bill that would impose the ban.
Meanwhile, the North Dakota Democratic Party-NPL said Monitor that Romanik's decision was “a victory for women's reproductive rights.”