Up now on both WashPo and at the NYT: Federal Judge Robert L. Pitman sides with the Biden DOJ and blocks SB8.
NYT:
A federal judge on Wednesday granted the Justice Department’s request to halt enforcement of the recently passed Texas law that bans nearly all abortions in the state, ruling that the law should be put on hold as the legal battle over the statute makes its way through the federal courts.
In his 113-page ruling, Judge Robert L. Pitman, a Federal District Court judge in Austin, sided with the Biden administration, which had sued to halt a law that has changed the landscape of the abortion fight and further fueled the national debate over whether abortion will remain legal.
At WashPo:
In a 113-page order, the judge said Texas officials had crafted an “unprecedented and aggressive scheme to deprive its citizens of a significant and well-established constitutional right.”
Since the law took effect Sept. 1, Pitman wrote, “women have been unlawfully prevented from exercising control over their lives in ways that are protected by the Constitution.”
“This Court will not sanction one more day of this offensive deprivation of such an important right,” the judge concluded.
There will be more efforts on this from the TX Attorney General, I am sure. But, this is a fairly clear and emphatic push-back from the Federal District Courts.