MONTGOMERY — U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson held a hearing on Wednesday in federal court over whether the State of Alabama could prosecute Alabama organizations that facilitate and fund out-of-state abortions for Alabama women.
The Yellowhammer Fund, an Alabama organization that facilitates out-of-state abortions, is suing Attorney General Steve Marshall over comments he made in 2022 arguing groups who help arrange and fund out-of-state abortions could be held criminally liable.
“I want to get this opinion out one way or another,” Thompson, a President Jimmy Carter-appointed judge, said in court on Wednesday.
Another similar lawsuit filed by the West Alabama Women’s Center against Marshall was also discussed on Wednesday.
“Yellowhammer Fund wants to reopen, do its business, and not be prosecuted,” Jamila Johnson, an attorney representing Yellowhammer Fund, said during the hearing.
Thompson asked attorneys from the Alabama Attorney General’s Office if a husband who drove his wife to Georgia to get an abortion could be prosecuted under the same law.
Dylan Mauldin, an assistant Alabama solicitor general, said the case was more about “the scale” of what organizations like the Yellowhammer Fund are doing.
“I think the state has a stronger interest when abortion is illegal in Alabama. You have Alabama organizations who hold themselves out as funding these abortions and that’s the whole purpose of the organization, not just to assist them with travel but pay for the travel and pay for the abortion,” Mauldin said at the hearing. “It’s an organization that is just doing this publicly. That’s the point of the organization, not just one time.”
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