The ruling, which was announced Tuesday, came from a Fulton County superior court judge, Robert McBurney came. He said key provisions of the state's six-week abortion ban were "plainly unconstitutional,” and his ruling blocked the law's further enforcement.
Sarah Parshall Perry, senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, tells AFN Judge McBurney ruled as if the U.S. Supreme Court had not overturned Roe v. Wade earlier this summer in a landmark ruling.
“And he determined that because Roe v Wade was good law at the time,” she says, “that the law passed by the Georgia legislature – democratically enacted through the democratic representative process – was itself illegal when passed."
In other words, McBurney defended Roe even after Justice Samuel Alito’s 98-page ruling explained why it was being overturned, and then the judge cited Roe to rule against the Georgia law.
Georgia’s abortion law, known as the Heartbeat Act, was passed in 2019. The law was under a court injunction that was lifted after the Dobbs ruling.
Perry says Judge McBurney, determined to rule against the law, “worked to get the outcome he wanted, not the outcome that was legally required.”
