Governor Tony Evers and Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul announced a lawsuit Tuesday challenging the criminal abortion ban in the state. The legal action comes after the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade last week after 50 years as a constitutional right to an abortion.
The lawsuit to block the state's abortion ban was filed in Dane County Circuit Court and named Republican leaders Chris Kapenga, Devin LeMahieu, and Robin Vos as defendants. Vos has already stated that he would back exceptions for rape and incest if the 1849 law was triggered. The plaintiffs include Kaul, the Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services, and the Wisconsin Medical Examining Board and its chair, Sheldon A. Wasserman, M.D.
According to the Associated Press, the lawsuit argues that statutes passed over thirty years ago supersede the ban from 1849, which is so old that no one can say it passed with the consent of modern generations.
Gov. Evers has already publicly announced that he would grant clemency to any Wisconsin physician convicted of performing an abortion under the state's 1849 law banning the procedure in almost all cases.
You can read the abortion ban complaint filed Tuesday by Attorney General Kaul here.
