LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Kentucky's near-total abortion ban and fetal heartbeat bill are the target of a new lawsuit filed in Kentucky Circuit Court Friday.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky and Planned Parenthood Kentucky announced their filing months after their initial attempt to overturn Kentucky's restrictive abortion bans failed before the state's Supreme Court.
The new 52-page class action lawsuit on behalf of an anonymous Kentuckian said the bans were causing an eight-week pregnant woman and those like her irreparable harm "by forcibly imposing the physical burdens and health risks of continued pregnancy and childbirth."
ACLU Kentucky Executive Director Amber Duke joined Planned Parenthood's Rebecca Gibron at a Friday afternoon press conference.
"We are here to represent a Kentucky woman," Duke said.
Duke said the new lawsuit would succeed where the last one failed because a woman, going under the pseudonym Jane Doe, came forward to claim harm to herself where the previous lawsuit relied on a health care provider suing on behalf of clients.
Duke quoted the woman at the press conference about her desire to have an abortion.
"This is my decision, not the government's or any other person's," she said.
Gibron said the lawsuit was necessary to protect potentially thousands of Kentuckians who aren't able to seek medical care.
"Access to reproductive health care has been denied for far too long — 494 days," she said.
Anti-abortion proponents like Addia Wuchner, Kentucky Right to Life's executive director, said they were keeping an eye on the latest legal developments.
"We're reviewing this case," Wuchner said.
She said Kentucky Right to Life would continue to fight for abortion bans in a post-Roe V. Wade world where each battle looks different from state to state.
"Everyone is fighting this battle, and it's not as easy as we thought it was going to be in the states," Wuchner said. "It's not a slam dunk and we just win."
David Walls with The Family Foundation said he believes the Kentucky Supreme Court will reject the ACLU's latest legal filing, and the voters would continue to hold control over abortion policy in Kentucky.
"We have got to move on from this mindset and recognize that every election at the federal level, at the state level, at the local level, the abortion issue is going to be front and center," Walls said.
ACLU representatives said they were confident in their case, and, since the filing was a class action lawsuit, urged pregnant women who wanted to be a part of the lawsuit to call them or Planned Parenthood.
As it is named in the lawsuit, WCPO reached out to Attorney General Daniel Cameron's office.
A spokesman issued this statement: “The Attorney General’s office is reviewing the complaint.”
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