The City of Eunice, a municipality of 3,000, is not acquiescing to New Mexico Atty. Gen. Raúl Torrez and Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s efforts to block it from enforcing an anti-abortion ordinance. The ordinance was passed by the town’s city council earlier this year.
On Monday, April 17, the City of Eunice filed a lawsuit in the Fifth District Court in Lea County against the two state officials and the state government of New Mexico. The suit claims that “… a federal law enacted in the 1870s trumps a new state law — set to take effect in June — that aims to prohibit jurisdictions from restricting access to reproductive health care, including abortion.”
Because of the magnitude of the issue, Eunice officials and anti-abortion supporters traveled to Washington D. C. to hold a press conference announcing the lawsuit’s filing.
According to New Mexico’s Republican State Sen. David Gallegos the announcement was held in the US capital because it, in conjunction with lawsuits from different jurisdictions nationwide, may be heard by the US Supreme Court. In Sen. Gallegos’s own words, “We’re hoping this will help fuel the fire to get [ the abortion issue] resolved.”
At the press conference in Washington D. C., Eunice Mayor Billy Hobbs stated, “The content of this lawsuit centers upon the ordinance we recently passed which – again – simply requires compliance with existing federal laws on abortion.” Mayor Hobbs added that he is honored “…to say here in our nation’s capital, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham and Attorney General Raul Torrez – we will see you in court.”
At the news conference Eunice Councilwoman Erica Jones added that a shortage of medical facilities exists in New Mexico. Jones said, “Right now we are losing hospitals and medical professionals and getting abortion facilities.” There are currently no abortion clinics in Lea County. Jones then reflected on Alexis Avila’s newborn, who after being tossed by her in a garbage dumpster on January 6, 2022, umbilical cord still attached, had to be airlifted to a children’s hospital in Lubbock, Texas for neonatal urgent medical care. Jones stated, “…the only option we had for that baby was to fly him to the nearest neonatal doctor, in a different state. … I question why we [in New Mexico] weren’t able to provide the same level of care to a newborn baby whose life depended on us.”
According to legal and health experts, anti-abortion measures like the one passed in Eunice often inhibit healthcare in an area. Clinics are unable or unwilling to set up in locations where strict or vague laws may interfere with their services. Many reproductive care centers provide a range of healthcare services aside from abortion, and anti-abortion laws around the country have had a negative impact on healthcare services in general, particularly when it comes to treating pregnant women.
Jones continued, “Right now our state’s leadership is focused on spending 10 million of our taxpayer dollars on opening an abortion facility in our state. What New Mexicans need is not more abortion clinics, but what New Mexicans truly need is more hospitals. … Abortion is not a savior, abortion is a destroyer. Abortion hurts women and ends the lives of our children.”
Laura Wight, co-founder of Eastern New Mexico Rising, which has been on the frontlines of the local fight for access to reproductive healthcare, disagrees with Jones’s statements. “Abortion providers are physicians and OBGYNS, and they provide a variety of preventative healthcare services and treatments aside from abortion,” Wight told the Lea County Tribune.
“What Councilwoman Jones fails to realize is that healthcare providers of all kinds will not feel welcome in any community where the local city or county government insists on having a hand in their scope of operations. Doctors are being driven away by these hostile environments. They just want to be able to practice medicine and assist their patients in making informed decisions.”
Lawsuit Uses Comstock Act As Basis
The City of Eunice’s lawsuit is based on the ancient 1873 Comstock Act which prohibits sending “obscene material” through the mail – calling out anything “designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion” as “obscene”. In total five jurisdictions, three cities and two counties in southeastern New Mexico, have adopted anti-abortion ordinances using the Comstock Act as their legal rationale. While these laws are still on the books, they have since been ruled to apply only to goods and services which are themselves illegal. Since abortion is not illegal, experts agree there is no basis for their application here. ACLU lawyer Lorie Chaiten told NPR about the issue, “I think that in a sane world, these kinds of arguments get laughed out of court.”
Representing Eunice in the lawsuit filed on Monday are attorneys Michael Seibel of Albuquerque, Eunice City Attorney Tommy Parker who resides in Hobbs and Jonathan Mitchell from Texas. Their lawsuit is based on the argument that essentially Comstock Act laws are the “supreme laws of the land” and that the Comstock Act preempts any state laws.
Current opinions by the U. S. Department of Justice (DOJ) do not confirm these allegations. According to the Albuquerque Journal, in December 2023, the DOJ “…issued an opinion for the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) stating that the law does not prohibit sending medication intended to induce an abortion through the mail as long as the sender is not intending that it will be used unlawfully.”
The DOJ opinion additionally states, “There are manifold ways in which recipients in every state may use these drugs, including to produce an abortion, without violating state law. Therefore, the mere mailing of such drugs to a particular jurisdiction is an insufficient basis for concluding that the sender intends them to be used unlawfully.”
A rightwing activist judge made news recently when he unilaterally suspended the FDA’s approval of a medical abortion pill, mifepristone. The U. S. Supreme Court is now considering that Texas judge’s ruling.
Atty. Gen.Torrez and Gov. Lujan Grisham Fight To Block Ordinances
As the Lea County Tribune previously reported, Atty. Gen.Torrez filed an ” emergency petition “to block the anti-abortion ordinances earlier this year. Atty. Gen. Torrez is on record as stating, “It is simply inappropriate, unlawful and unconstitutional for local governments to use their limited authority to try to create a patchwork of regulations that would deny women access to essential health care services in their community.”
Although Torrez’s petition does not specifically include Eunice, The New Mexico Supreme Court temporarily agreed with him and on March 31 ordered that the ordinances enacted by four other southeastern New Mexico jurisdictions “…shall have no effect until further order of the court.”
Gov. Lujan Grisham earlier signed the Reproductive and Gender-Affirming Health Care Act. The Act specifically prevents local authorities, such as the Eunice city council, from interfering in people’s access to reproductive services, including abortion. Gov. Lujan Grisham also signed legislation that protects doctors and nurses who perform reproductive health care services from “legal liability”. About the bills she signed, Gov Lujan Grisham said, “We feel very confident the bills we’ve signed into law will withstand any legal challenges in the state.
