Just last week, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court upheld unnecessary abortion restrictions while denying basic facts about the closing of abortion clinics in the Rio Grande Valley.

Now Whole Woman's Health is fighting back. They filed a lawsuit in federal court to keep the doors of their Rio Grande Valley and El Paso clinics open. Unless the suit prevails, the Rio Grande Valley will be left without an abortion provider and women will be forced to travel 300 hundred miles for their constitutional right to an abortion. (The full lawsuit is available here.)

Help #FightBackTX! Join our friends at NARAL Pro-Choice Texas for activist trainings across the state. Click here to find a training near you and learn how you can get involved today!

The goal of the lawsuit is two-fold:

1. Get the court to block the requirement that abortion providers obtain admitting privileges at local hospitals, as it applies to Whole Woman’s Health in McAllen and Reproductive Health Services in El Paso - the only providers in their respective region.

2. Strike down HB2’s ambulatory surgical center building requirement provision; if it takes effect September 1, any reproductive health clinic that offers abortion would have to become a mini-hospitals or close entirely. As a result, there could only be 6 abortion clinics in all of Texas, and none west or south of San Antonio.

From the New York Times story, "Abortion Providers in Texas Sue Over a Restrictive Rule That Could Close Clinics":

Health clinics offering abortions in Texas filed a federal lawsuit on Wednesday to block a new state rule that could shut down more than half of the state’s remaining providers this fall, forcing women seeking an abortion in southern and western Texas to drive several hundred miles each way or go out of state.

The rule, part of a sweeping anti-abortion law passed last year, requires that all clinics providing abortions at any stage of pregnancy, including nonsurgical drug-induced abortions, meet the costly building standards of ambulatory surgery centers.

Fortunately, you can help #FightBackTX! Join our friends at NARAL Pro-Choice Texas for activist trainings across the state. Click here to find a training near you and learn how you can get involved today!

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