Judge James Ho's Connections to the Anti-Abortion Movement
(sick, twisted, misogynistic pervert)
Judge James Ho’s Connections to the Anti-Abortion Movement
10/5/2023 by Ansev Demirhan and Evan Vorpahl
An extreme right-wing judge and former clerk for Clarence Thomas, James Ho has close ties to anti-abortion and dark money groups.
James Ho (left), a U.S. circuit judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, speaks alongside Thomas Beall Griffith, a former U.S. circuit judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, at a Federalist Society convention in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 10, 2022. (Shuran Huang / The Washington Post via Getty Images)
In August, three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (which covers Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi) ruled that mifepristone—the most widely used abortifacient, and more commonly known as the abortion pill—could no longer be provided by mail. They imposed a new requirement that the medicine only be administered in the presence of a physician. They also limited the use of this drug to the first seven weeks of pregnancy, even though it is safe to use at least throughout the first 10 weeks. The ruling did overturn a lower federal court edict from Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk—a Trump-appointed judge who failed to disclose to the U.S. Senate and the American people his recent anti-abortion writings—to revoke the FDA’s 23-year old approval of mifepristone as a safe drug for Americans seeking abortions.
The Fifth Circuit’s restrictions are held until the U.S. Supreme Court weighs in on the case. But abortion-rights supporters are skeptical of the nation’s highest Court, which is still stacked with the same right-wing justices who overturned Roe. In the aftermath of the Dobbs ruling, GOP-controlled states moved immediately to impose restrictive and dangerous abortion bans—creating a dire need for mail-order mifepristone. Three Republican-nominated judges issued the Fifth Circuit ruling. But one of the judges, James Ho, issued a concurring opinion, arguing the ruling did not go far enough. Ho declared that the FDA’s 2000 approval of mifepristone should be revoked. In order to justify this extreme legal position, he suggested that litigants could claim a novel “aesthetic injury,” an approach found in environmental law.
Ho clerked for Clarence Thomas and has been a member of the Leonard Leo-led Federalist Society. The judge has referred to abortion as “the immoral, tragic, and violent taking of innocent human life.” He and his spouse, Allyson Ho, have been running in the same circles as key players in the assault against abortion access in the U.S. for years. According to Judge Ho’s financial disclosures, Allyson Ho regularly participated in paid speaking engagements for the far-right group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)—the dark money group that argued the mifepristone case. (ADF has been designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an anti-LGBTQ hate group.) Despite this financial connection, Ho did not recuse himself from the case. He purportedly “consulted the judiciary’s ethics advisor,” and he claimed Allyson donates the honoraria to “charity,” notwithstanding the conflict of interest rules in Canon 2 of the Code of Conduct for U.S. Judges.
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Clarence Thomas listens to former President George W. Bush speak at a Federalist Society gala on Nov. 15, 2007. (Aude Guerrucci-Pool / Getty Images)
Ho’s opinion completely ignores the very real “bad” and “unhealthy” conditions pregnant people face when forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy—like the deterioration of mental health and long-term negative socioeconomic effects. There’s also the terrifying prospect of giving birth in a country with one of the highest maternal mortality rates among wealthy nations. Maternal mortality rates vary from state to state. Mississippi—where the road to overturning Roe began—had the highest rate in the U.S. in 2021. Incidentally, Mississippi has the second largest Black population in the U.S., with Black people experiencing an even greater chance of maternal mortality due to internalized and systemic racism within the field of medicine. Judge Ho disregards these facts, in favor of the “delight” forced pregnancies would bring to physicians who are not responsible for carrying the pregnancy or raising the child. Over a year after the Supreme Court stripped millions of Americans of their constitutional reproductive rights, access to the abortion pill is more important than ever. The mifepristone case is no doubt headed back to the U.S. Supreme Court, where the same justices—handpicked by Leonard Leo to ostensibly eliminate abortion access, and take away many other freedoms)—will ultimately decide the level of access Americans will have to the abortion pill.
https://msmagazine.com/2023/10/05/judge-james-ho-abortion/