Roe V. Wade Struck Down, Future Of Abortion In PA Now Up To Voters

PENNSYLVANIA — In a monumental reversal of one of its most widely known landmark decisions, the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down Roe v. Wade, ending federal protections for abortion that have stood as law for nearly half a century. It places a renewed focus on Pennsylvania's gubernatorial election in the fall, which now will determine the future of abortion in the state.

The 6-3 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, widely expected ever since a draft opinion was leaked earlier this year, places Pennsylvania as one of the 24 states that is likely to still have abortion protections in place at the state level for the foreseeable future.

Pennsylvania's law allows for abortions up to 24 weeks into pregnancy. While an eager Republican legislature would leap on the chance to put restrictions in place, Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf would veto any such legislation.

"Abortion will stay legal in Pennsylvania as long as I'm governor," he reiterated in a statement Thursday morning.

RELATED: Roe V. Wade Overturned: Abortion Rights Left To States To Decide

But with Wolf leaving in November, voters will decide if they want to continue his policies with Attorney General Josh Shapiro, or if they'll follow the Supreme Court in banning abortions and go with staunch Trump ally Doug Mastriano.

"This is a devastating day in America," Shapiro said Friday. "A woman's right to choose now depends on the state in which she lives, and the decision will be made by our next Governor."

Mastriano has said he supports an abortion ban with no exceptions, even for instances of rape and incest. He's introduced legislation as a state senator, the Heartbeat Bill, that would codify this into law.

At least 26 states are certain or likely to make it nearly impossible for a woman to get a procedure that was legal for her mother, grandmother or even great-grandmother, according to the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion rights research and policy group.

Pennsylvania's populous neighbors, both very near and far, could find themselves turning to the Keystone State as an abortion refuge. Two of those 26 are immediately on the state's borders: West Virginia and Ohio.

Months before the Roe v. Wade draft opinion was even leaked, healthcare providers in Pennsylvania were preparing for just such a contingency. Sydney Etheredge, the CEO of Planned Parenthood in Western Pennsylvania, told the PA Capitol Star that patients were welcome "whether they're in our region or in sister regions and states nearby."

While clinics are doing what they can to prepare for the influx, an overload might be inevitable. ABout 85 percent of the state's counties do not have abortion clinics in the first place, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

With the decision, abortion would be illegal or a nearly impossible procedure to get in about half of U.S. states, including large swaths of the South, Midwest and Northern Plains.

President Joe Biden said in an appearance on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" in Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 8, that he's weighing executive actions and pushing Congress to codify abortion rights previously guaranteed in Roe.

Abortion is already illegal or soon will be in 13 states with pre-existing “trigger” laws banning abortion set to take effect with the dismantling of Roe and Casey, and another four are poised to ban it, according to the Guttmcher Institute. Nine have so-called fetal heartbeat laws that make the procedure illegal before many women know they are pregnant.

Abortion rights were long considered settled law; and even as conservative states pushed at-the-time unconstitutional fetal heartbeat laws and others restricting abortion access to bring the court to this moment, many legal scholars doubted a right that generations of women and men had counted on was in serious jeopardy.

The case that made it to a full hearing before the court, Mississippi’s 15-week ban on abortion, came after former President Donald Trump appointed three conservative judges — Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and, a few months before his term ended, Amy Coney Barrett, who replaced liberal stalwart Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died in September 2020.

The court heard oral arguments on the Mississippi case in December.

Lawyers for the state of Mississippi had proposed an array of mechanisms to uphold the 15-week abortion ban but said the court ultimately should overturn the "egregiously wrong" Roe and Casey rulings.

If the court "does not impose a substantial obstacle to 'a significant number of women' seeking abortions," the state argued at the time, the justices should reinterpret the "undue burden" standard established in Roe and give the state the authority to "prohibit elective abortions before viability" of the fetus.