COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Ohio’s most far-reaching law restricting abortion was struck down Thursday by a county judge who said the amendment voters approved last year enshrining reproductive rights made it unconstitutional the so-called law of heart rhythm.

The application of the 2019 law banning most abortions once cardiac activity is detected – from six weeks of pregnancy, before many women know they are pregnant – had been suspended pending the challenge before the judge of the Common Pleas of Hamilton County, Christian Jenkins.

Jenkins said that when the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and returned power over the issue of abortion to the states, “the Ohio attorney general clearly didn’t get the memo.”

The ACLU of Ohio filed the lawsuit on behalf of a group of abortion providers in the state, the second round of lawsuits filed to challenge the law.

“This is a momentous decision that demonstrates the power of Ohio’s new reproductive freedom amendment in practice,” said Jessie Hill, cooperating attorney for the ACLU of Ohio, in a press release. “The six-week ban is blatantly unconstitutional and has no place in our law. »

Jenkins said Republican Attorney General Dave Yost urged his court to leave all but one provision of the 2019 law intact, “even after a majority of Ohio voters — presumably women and men — approved an amendment to the Ohio Constitution protecting the right to pre-viability of abortion.

An initial lawsuit was filed in federal court in 2019, where the law was first blocked under the landmark Roe v. Wade of 1973. It was briefly allowed to take effect in 2022 after Roe was overturned. Opponents of the law then turned to the state court system, where the ban was again suspended. They argued that the law violated protections in the Ohio Constitution that guarantee individual liberty and equal protection, and that it was unconstitutionally vague.

After his predecessor twice vetoed the measure citing Roe, Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine signed the 2019 law once nominations by then-President Donald Trump , solidified the Supreme Court’s conservative majority and raised hopes among abortion opponents.

The Ohio litigation unfolded alongside a national upheaval over abortion rights that followed the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe, including pushes for a constitutional amendment in Ohio and a host of other states. Issue 1, the amendment passed by Ohio voters last year, gives every person in Ohio “the right to make and carry out their own reproductive decisions.”

Yost acknowledged in court filings this spring that the amendment made Ohio’s ban unconstitutional, but sought to maintain other elements of the 2019 law, including certain notification and enforcement provisions. reporting.

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