WASHINGTON — A Louisville woman seven to eight weeks pregnant has filed a challenge to Kentucky’s abortion bans, arguing they violate constitutional rights to privacy and self-determination.

What You Need To Know

  • A Louisville woman who is pregnant has filed a challenge to Kentucky’s abortion bans

  • The lawsuit argues the bans violate constitutional rights to privacy and self-determination

  • It’s the latest in a series of legal attempts to restore abortion access in the commonwealth

  • Kentucky’s near-total abortion ban went into effect after the U.S. Supreme Court ended the federal right to an abortion with the reversal of Roe v. Wade in 2022

“I feel overwhelmed and frustrated that I cannot access abortion care here in my own state, and I have started the difficult process of arranging to get care in another state where it’s legal,” the woman, who filed the legal action under the pseudonym Mary Poe, said in a written statement.

“I am bringing this case to ensure that other Kentuckians will not have to go through what I am going through, and instead will be able to get the health care they need in our community.”

Kentucky’s near-total abortion ban went into effect after the U.S. Supreme Court ended the federal right to an abortion with the reversal of Roe v. Wade in 2022.

Rep. Morgan McGarvey, D-Louisville, applauded the plaintiff in the Kentucky case.

“I’m really glad that we have a courageous woman who is willing to put herself in this position of challenging the law,” McGarvey said Thursday. “I do think it violates Kentucky’s constitution.”

Attorney General Russell Coleman, R-Ky., promised to “zealously work to uphold these laws in court,” but added that he supports changing the law to add exceptions for rape and incest.

“This mainstream position is consistent with my faith, and I believe is shared by most Kentuckians, including so many who consider themselves pro-life,” Coleman said in a statement.

But that view is not shared by Kentucky Right To Life, according to its executive director, Addia Wuchner.

“He’s not a lawmaker, he’s the attorney general,” Wuchner told Spectrum News Friday. “And that is the purview of the members of the General Assembly. Kentucky Right to Life and our supporters across the state have always honored life from the moment of conception … We think our attorney general and his staff and his solicitor general are going to do a tremendous job defending the laws of Kentucky and that’s exactly what we expect them to do.”

Last year, attorneys dropped a different class-action lawsuit challenging Kentucky’s abortion bans after they said the plaintiff seeking to terminate her pregnancy later learned her embryo no longer had cardiac activity.

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