The Trump administration on Monday filed a motion to dismiss a lawsuit brought by Missouri, Idaho, and Kansas about the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) deregulation of the abortion pill.
While Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) did not discuss the merits of the case, attorneys contended states lack standing to sue in a Texas court and argued for the case either to be dismissed or transferred to another court.
“Regardless of the merits of the States’ claims, the States cannot proceed in this Court,” the DOJ filing reads.”
“The States are free to pursue their claims in a District where venue is proper, but the States’ claims before this Court must be dismissed or transferred pursuant to the venue statute’s mandatory command,” it reads.
The original lawsuit dates all the way back to November 2022 when pro-life doctors challenged the FDA to prevent rolling back safety restrictions on mifepristone, the first drug used in a two-drug medication abortion regimen. The Supreme Court ultimately dismissed the case in June 2024, ruling that the doctors lacked standing to sue.
The ruling left open the opportunity to states to sue, and Missouri, Idaho, and Kansas ultimately jumped onto pro-life doctors’ already-dismissed lawsuit to continue waging war against the pill.
The lawsuit specifically goes after FDA’s 2016 action extending the permissible gestational age of the baby for which a girl or woman may take abortion drugs from seven weeks gestation to ten weeks gestation, as well as the 2021 rule change allowing abortionists to send mifepristone through the mail, among other changes.
READ MORE: Exclusive — Shocking Data Suggests Abortion Pill Complications 22 Times Higher Than Previously Reported: ‘FDA Must Reinstate Stronger Safeguards’
In a medication abortion, mifepristone — also called by the brand name Mifeprex created by Danco Laboratories — blocks the action of progesterone, which the mother’s body produces to nourish the pregnancy. When progesterone is blocked, the lining of the mother’s uterus deteriorates, and blood and nourishment are cut off to the developing baby, who then dies inside the mother’s womb. The drug misoprostol (also called Cytotec) then causes contractions and bleeding to expel the baby from the mother’s uterus.
In 2023, medication abortions accounted for 63 percent of all abortions within the formal U.S. healthcare system — meaning an estimated 642,700 unborn babies died in medication abortions, according to the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute. The percentage was up from an estimated 53 percent in 2020 and 39 percent in 2017. The report did not account for abortion pills obtained through underground national and international networks, including those that send pills to women in states with abortion restrictions.
The case is Missouri v. FDA, No. 2:22-cv-223 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas.
Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton
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