Judge Shuts Down Texas Anti-Abortion Law

A federal judge on Friday shut down a key part of Texas’s abortion law which would have shuttered over a dozen of the state’s clinics. The restrictions would have left only seven abortion clinics in the entire state come Monday. "The overall effect of the provisions is to create an impermissible obstacle as applied to all women seeking a previability abortion," U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel wrote in his 21-page ruling. Republican Gov. Rick Perry signed the anti-abortion bill into law in 2013. It would have required abortion facilities in the state to meet hospital-level standards (including mandatory operating rooms and air filtration systems), which clinics called a backdoor attempt to outlaw abortions entirely.