Wait, Did Texas Hide Evidence On Abortion Case From SCOTUS?
Credit: Democracy Now!
June 27, 2016

If this is true, the people who hid information from The Supreme Court should go to prison for a long time. NBC News:

[A}mong the reams of evidence presented to the high court and the public debate in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, something is still missing: A full, official account of the initial impact of the law on Texas women.

A state employee with knowledge of the annual data Texas collects on abortion spoke to NBC News and is accusing state officials overseeing the Department of Health Services of intentionally blocking the information and instructing staff members to mislead people who ask for it. Because fact-finding traditionally ends after such a case goes to trial, long before it reaches the Supreme Court, the justices may or may not have considered it. But in the court of public opinion, the data could potentially undermine Texas' official argument that its requirements pose no particular burden on women.

Like every one with a conscience, the ACLU is not amused:

In a June 15 letter, the ACLU of Texas, which first referred the state employee to NBC News, wrote, "Rather than responding honestly and claiming a legal basis for withholding the 2014 statistical tables, it appears that your agency has chosen to hide the truth." The letter continued, referring to Texas' state public records law, "Lying in response to Public Information Act requests would subvert the purpose of the Act, whether or not there is an arguable legal basis for withholding information."

The information could also potentially undermine Texas' rationale for the law, which is that it makes women safer.

Texas' rationale for the TRAP laws has always been purely political and not at all about women's safety. And at some point, if the forced birther state employees of Texas are found to have cheated their way to a fake victory in the court, pitchforks and torches won't be good enough for them.

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