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All-Options v. Attorney General of Indiana

Status: Ongoing
Last Update: June 30, 2021

What's at Stake

This lawsuit, brought by a coalition of health care providers and a pregnancy resource center, challenges several recently enacted abortion restrictions in Indiana, including a measure forcing health care providers to share false and misleading information with their patients about “reversing” a medication abortion, a bogus claim that may lead some patients to end a pregnancy based on the mistaken belief that its effects can later be undone.

On June 30, 2021, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana granted plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction, blocking the restrictions from taking effect. The case is currently scheduled for trial in August 2023.

There is no scientific evidence that a medication abortion can be halted after a patient has taken the first medication and leading medical organizations oppose these requirements. Forcing providers to give their patients this misinformation is both unethical and unconstitutional; courts in North Dakota, Oklahoma, and Tennessee have blocked similar restrictions.

The lawsuit also challenges a 2021 ban on patients’ ability to obtain medication abortion via telemedicine. A nearly identical ban is already being considered by a federal district court judge in separate litigation – Whole Woman’s Health Alliance v. Rokita – challenging a host of abortion restrictions in Indiana.

These are not the only legal challenges to the myriad obstacles and indignities Hoosiers face when they need an abortion. Indiana’s web of abortion restrictions includes various Targeted Regulation of Abortion Provider (“TRAP”) laws; a ban on the standard method for abortion care starting in the earliest weeks of the second trimester; and a law restricting minors’ access to abortion.

The plaintiffs in this challenge include All-Options, Whole Woman’s Health Alliance, Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai‘i, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky, Women’s Med Group Professional Corporation and individual physicians. They are represented by the Lawyering Project, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the ACLU, the ACLU of Indiana, and Katherine D. Jack of the Jack Law Office LLC. The case was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis Division.

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