How long will anti-abortion opponents keep going full-speed ahead, passing bans and restrictions on safe, healthcare procedures that the courts later knock down as unconstitutional?
Opinion
House Speaker Chip Neiman, R-Hulett, said as long as it takes. After retired District Court Judge Thomas Campbell on Friday handed down a sweeping ruling against three unconstitutional laws that state lawmakers passed in 2025, Neiman criticized the courts for going against “the will of the Legislature.”
Please note that he did not say the will of Wyomingites. That’s notable because the far-right Freedom Caucus and its allies know they do not have public support.
If they did, they would have done what Gov. Mark Gordon told them last year and voted to put a constitutional amendment to ban abortion on the ballot this November. Instead, they went back to a formula that hasn’t worked yet by passing three bills destined to be challenged by pro-choice plaintiffs who saw two abortion bans thrown out by the Wyoming Supreme Court prior to this year’s legislative session.
Campbell ruled against a trio of new restrictions. One imposed a mandatory, invasive ultrasound requirement and a 48-hour waiting period for women seeking abortions. The second was a new set of more stringent regulations on abortion clinics, intended to make their operation too expensive. The third restricted abortions by governing the prescription of off-label medications.
Campbell followed the Wyoming Supreme Court’s previous reasoning. He ruled that the state’s restrictions on abortion violated the constitutional protection for Wyomingites to make their own health care decisions without interference by the government.
Ironically, such protection wouldn’t be enshrined in the Wyoming Constitution today if Republicans hadn’t thumbed their nose at then-President Barack Obama’s signature win during his first term, the Affordable Care Act. In 2012, these zealots adopted a constitutional amendment they sold to voters as the way to prevent the federal government from infringing on healthcare autonomy.
The amendment wasn’t necessary to stop Obamacare. But it’s proven effective at protecting abortion rights. The Wyoming Supreme Court ruled 4-1 in January against two statewide bans because abortion is a fundamental health right under the constitution.
To prevail in court, the state would have to show it has a compelling interest to restrict abortions and the Legislature passed laws that were narrowly tailored to do so. The Wyoming Attorney General’s Office, which defended lawmakers’ work, struck out three times with Campbell, who repeatedly noted that defenders of the law did not offer evidence backing their claims.
Campbell wrote that the ultrasound and waiting period for abortions were both medically unnecessary. He added that plaintiffs cited Wyoming Department of Health data indicating zero complications or deaths resulting from abortion in the state.
The state tried to put Wellspring Health Access in Casper, the only Wyoming clinic that provides surgical and medication abortions, out of business by classifying it “an ambulatory surgical center” that needed to make expensive changes to its facilities to meet state regulations. But Campbell concluded there was no evidence or a causal link to indicate that not operating under such stringent regulations would negatively impact women’s health and welfare.
The final law that was struck down would have protected physicians who prescribe FDA-approved medications for off-label purposes, like Ivermectin for COVID-19. But the Legislature made sure physicians who prescribed off-label treatments such as the combination of mifepristone and misoprostol, the most common medications used for chemical abortions, would not be covered.
Campbell said carving out physicians who prescribe chemical abortions from the bill would have “greenlit” consequences for them from medical regulatory agencies.
The Legislature is hanging its collective hat on the notion that a ban on abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, usually after six weeks, can pass constitutional muster. But a different district court judge already cited the constitutional provision protecting abortion as a fundamental right when he temporarily blocked enforcement of the new law in April.
There is no practical reason to believe that the law won’t be ruled unconstitutional by the same judge or the state Supreme Court, if the case is ultimately appealed to that venue.
Neiman criticized the judiciary in a video posted to the Freedom Caucus’ Facebook page for thwarting and ignoring the will of the Legislature.
The caucus tried this same tactic when it threatened to downsize the Wyoming Supreme Court, make judges an elected position, and even cut $3.6 million for court security. The latter was proposed by Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, Freedom Caucus chair, who is now running for secretary of state. All of these far-right tantrums failed.
The Freedom Caucus already controls the Wyoming House. Now, Neiman and four other Freedom Caucus members or allies — Reps. Abby Angelos of Gillette, Paul Hoeft of Powell, Ken Pendergraft of Sheridan and Daniel Singh of Cheyenne — are running for the Senate to try to take over the upper chamber. In light of the caucus’ failure to ban or restrict abortions and having its package of draconian budget cuts shot down in flames, it should be a fool’s errand.
But the Freedom Caucus is hell-bent on gaining power. The best way to keep this from happening is to defeat its members and followers in the Republican primary on Aug. 18.
The focus should be dumping the anti-abortion lawmakers who want to invade doctors’ offices and keep women from making their own healthcare choices, and replacing them with candidates who respect the Wyoming Constitution.
The Freedom Caucus continues to push a false narrative that Wyomingites want to ban all abortions. Surveys and previous elections show it’s not true.
A November 2024 University of Wyoming poll found only 10% of residents backed a total abortion ban. Abortion restrictions with exceptions for rape, incest, or when a woman’s life is in danger were favored by 31%.
Another 20% said the law should permit abortion for those reasons and others, after the need for an abortion has been clearly established. And 39% said abortion should be a personal choice.
Those numbers don’t add up for a group of lawmakers that insists on enacting a total ban on abortion and keeps passing laws that would imprison physicians who perform the safe procedures. They know voters won’t pass it.
The only time an abortion ban initiative was put on a Wyoming ballot was in 1994, and it failed with only 39% in favor.
In response to last week’s court losses, Neiman vowed, “We will not quit, we will not give up, and we will not stop.”
I believe he’s telling the truth, which means everyone who wants to uphold the constitution and preserve the right of adults to make their own healthcare decisions must show up at the polls with a critical common goal: Keep them all out of office.
While arguments describing the demise of the “traditional American family ” are accurate, the philosophical context from which they are drawn is why too many see the changes human society is experiencing a bad thing. What too many white cis-men, do not understand is that, yes when safe widespread birth control became available to women of childbearing age, a freedom that was denied to them by their reproductive biology was the result. Since Western Society was woven together by the biblical version of heterosexual marriage, any relationship that fell outside that normative standard has been branded as ‘un-natural’ by the men who the Bible’s creation story theologically put in charge of everything. That women have lived as being relegated to nothing more than brood mares for over 2000 years is something too many will never understand. But it is true, birth control has finally taken the Christian Patriarchy and it’s cis-men-only structures of power to task. Life is change and the fear too many cis-men are experiencing is understandable, but all of us who are not heterosexual white men have existed with existential fear and its violence for over 2000 years…. patriarchal domination is coming to an end and shaming and blaming doesn’t work anymore. Life always finds a way to break free from the bonds that do not allow for the flourishing of everyone. Nature thrives on diversity, so does humanity.
Freedom Caucus: you lost. Get over it and move on to your next target.
Basically it really boils down to when it is acceptable for one human to kill (emf the life of anotuer.
Rachel Rodriguez is a fanatic who is trying to enact her extreme religious beliefs into law. In my opinion she has no business holding elected office.
It’s amazing how antigovernment the freeddumb carcus is…… yet they want to Control what a woman can and cannot do with her body. The people of Wyoming voted that we did not want the government to control our health.
If they want to ban abortion, put it on the ballot and see whether the people of Wyoming say. They do not want to do this as they will lose.
This topic has been drawn out too far and too much time and money has been spent on the stupid attempts to get around this constitutional, right
Please vote these people out of office.
Alert. We really Really REALLY need to not vote Rachel Rodriguez into the state’s 2nd highest office of Secretary of State a/k/a Lieutenant Governor.
Rachel is the firebreathing dragoness behind most of the recent years’ heinous ridiculous superfluorus anti-abortion bills that have been introduced into the Legislature since she first took her seat there. The California transplant has no original political thoughts or vision of her own . She gets her boilerplate dogma from the national anti-abortion activist groups.
Wyoming voter turnout this August is more important than it has ever been in my 75 year lifetime here. The Freedom Caucus that she chairs has been able to get into office with as little as 15 percent of the registered vote. The very best thing we can do to stop the anti-abortion scourge is exactly what Kerry suggests. The antidote is administered at the voting booth .
Vote “NO” on Rachel Rodriguez for Secretary of State in the Primary.
Why is being able to intentionally end an unborn human beings life at the core of left\liberal dogma?
Chad- do you not know any Pro-choice Republicans or Independents ?I certainly do. Quit blaming the Left or imaginary liberals.
Pro-abortion Republicans and independents usually dont make it the bedrock foundation and highest priority of their issue positions.
Dems/Left essentially make it a priority over all else. Abortion is the holy sacrament issue of the left.
Also got to love all the money spent on all these court cases that they keep loosing.
Just put the issue on the ballot. Let the voters decide.
Why is intentionally ending a human beings life at the core of left\liberal dogma?
Why do you keep beating the drum in calling a fetus a human being or a child, or whatever tickles your fancy today?
Both science and reason tell us that the target of an elective abortion is already a little human being at the fetal stage of a unique human life.
Each new little daughter or son is already alive, already here in her or his pregnant mom’s womb.
Each mom together with her little one, before as well after birth, deserves our love, our protection and our practical help and care.
The idea that right to lifers who are really right to birthers are protecting the unborn is questionable. There is more to be concerned with than simply being born. Who assists by taking meals away from hungry kids and fails to care about the hunger in Wyoming? Who is worrying about the health and dental care of children? Who is working to solve problems of kids who age out of the foster care system and then are on their own? How is an 18 year old with no resources expected to have anything but a very difficult life? Who is working to help those who do not want a pregnancy to prevent an unwanted pregnancy? Wyoming has had its share of child abuse and child death. Is anyone correlating to see what could have been done to prevent these deaths or look toward ways to prevent future incidents? Electing those who are willing to work on problems should be elected.
When does the soul enter the body? In utero or at birth?