The US Department of Justice promised Monday, September 6 to protect, with the means of the federal state, the clinics performing abortions in Texas, a southern state which has just adopted extremely restrictive legislation on the voluntary termination of pregnancy. .
Read also Anti-abortion law in Texas: understand everything about the ongoing legal battle
The ministry "
will provide federal law enforcement support if an abortion clinic or sexual and reproductive health center is attacked,
" Minister Merrick Garland said in a statement.
"No violence" tolerated
Contacts have already been made with prosecutors and with the offices of the FBI in Texas, it is specified.
"
We will not tolerate any violence, physical hindrance or material harm against people seeking or providing contraceptive services
," the statement said.
The ministry invokes a law of 1994 (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act or “
FACE
”), which prohibits any form of violence against the exercise of the right to abortion.
The Biden administration is also looking for ways to legally counter Texan law, which the US Supreme Court has refused to suspend, dealing a major blow to abortion rights.
Read alsoTexas seeks to ban abortion
Texas now prohibits abortion once the embryo's heartbeat is detected, around six weeks pregnant, when most women don't even know they're pregnant.
Except in a medical emergency.