A federal judge on Tuesday blocked a law passed in Arkansas that would ban nearly all abortions.
The law, which was set to take effect on Friday, had been approved by Arkansas’s Republican-led legislature and signed by the state’s Republican governor, Asa Hutchinson.
However, US district judge Kristine Baker issued a preliminary injunction, temporarily halting the law in its tracks, in a win for pro-choice supporters, while a lawsuit against its constitutionality proceeds.
The law would ban clinical providers from carrying out abortions “except to save the life of a pregnant woman in a medical emergency”. It also does not provide exceptions for pregnancies occurring through incest or rape or involving fetal anomalies.
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