{"id":274448,"date":"2022-08-18T18:41:58","date_gmt":"2022-08-18T23:41:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=274448"},"modified":"2022-08-18T16:27:59","modified_gmt":"2022-08-18T21:27:59","slug":"georgia-heartbeat-stand-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/georgia-heartbeat-stand-lawsuit\/","title":{"rendered":"Georgia heartbeat law to stand while lawsuit is considered"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A Georgia judge has allowed a law protecting preborn children once a preborn child’s heartbeat is detected to remain in effect. Although the law is currently at the center of a lawsuit brought by the abortion industry, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ruled Monday that the law can be enforced while the lawsuit makes its way through the courts.<\/p>\n

The ruling comes after the plaintiffs asked the court to issue a temporary injunction on the law during a hearing last week. But McBurney said that he can’t block the law because he had not yet determined whether or not it is unconstitutional. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution<\/a>, a hearing has not yet been set for the court to determine the law’s constitutionality.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Court is making no finding on the merits of this important litigation,\u201d McBurney wrote. \u201cThe question of whether it is constitutional for the State to force a woman to carry to term a six-week-old embryo against her wishes, even in the face of serious medical risk, remains to be answered. Until it is, however, the LIFE Act remains in effect.\u201d<\/p>\n

The heartbeat law, known as the Georgia LIFE Act, prohibits abortion after the detection of an embryonic or fetal heartbeat (usually detectable by six weeks, though the heart\u00a0begins to beat<\/a>\u00a0around 16-22 days). It went into effect last month after an 11th Circuit Court of Appeals judge lifted an injunction on the law.<\/p>\n

READ: Georgia recognizes preborn children with heartbeats as dependents on state tax returns<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n