Beautiful Virgin Islands

Tuesday, Jun 03, 2025

Texas judge's ruling to ban mifepristone nationwide cites Wikipedia, contains pro-life talking points, and gets basic facts about abortion wrong: Experts say it's 'completely flawed'

Texas judge's ruling to ban mifepristone nationwide cites Wikipedia, contains pro-life talking points, and gets basic facts about abortion wrong: Experts say it's 'completely flawed'

Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk overturned FDA approval of an abortion medication with a ruling full of inaccuracies, legal and healthcare experts told Insider.

A Texas judge on Friday overturned the nationwide FDA approval of abortion medication with a ruling that legal and healthcare experts told Insider is full of inaccuracies.

In addition to citing the Wikipedia definitions for both "pregnancy" and "disease" in his ruling, Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk falsely claimed abortion medication "ultimately starves the unborn human until death" and made sweeping generalizations about the psychological impact of abortions on women who receive them — which health care providers told Insider aren't accurate.

"Whim and caprice aren't the same as facts and evidence, and are not an objective foundation for good law," Los Angeles attorney Vineet Dubey, co-founder of Custodio & Dubey LLP, a law firm specializing in injury, environmental litigation, and civil rights cases, said in a statement emailed to Insider, indicating the judge's ruling came "without the knowledge necessary to make an informed decision."

Dubey added: "Judges aren't intended to be subject matter experts outside of interpreting the law."


The ruling misstates how the drug works


The conservative, Trump-appointed Texas judge behind the ruling in the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA case has long supported the anti-abortion movement. His mother, Dorothy, is a microbiologist who began working at anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers, his sister, Jennifer Griffith, told The Washington Post.

In his ruling, Kacsmaryk included common phrases used by anti-abortion activists, not scientists, and misinformation.

"Mifepristone — also known as RU-486 or Mifeprex — is a synthetic steroid that blocks the hormone progesterone, halts nutrition, and ultimately starves the unborn human until death," Kacsmaryk's ruling reads, calling those who provide the medication "abortionists."

But an OB-GYN told Insider the judge's interpretation of what the drug does is medically inaccurate.

"I would say that's not a medical description of the way that that it works," Daniel Grossman, MD, the director of the University of California San Francisco's reproductive health care program, Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH), told Insider.

Mifepristone, Grossman said, blocks the progesterone receptor early in the pregnancy to keep the lining of the uterus from getting thick enough for an embryo to successfully implant on it, causing the pregnancy to start to separate from the uterine wall. Working in tandem with a second medication called misoprostol, which causes the contraction of the uterus, the drugs cause the expulsion of the embryo.

The process is "kind of like having a really heavy, crampy period," according to Planned Parenthood.

"From a medical perspective, we call the developing pregnancy an embryo at this stage. Mifepristone and misoprostol are sometimes used before we can even see an embryo on ultrasound," Grossman told Insider. "So, that term 'unborn human' — that's not a medical term that we use."

He added: "And the language around nutrition and starvation is certainly very emotional language, but those aren't the medical terms that we use in this context."

Prior to implanting in the uterine lining and the development of a placenta, an embryo relies on nutrients from endometrial secretions, which are present during the second half of the menstrual cycle whether a pregnancy occurs or not, according to SITNBoston, a Harvard science publication.


"Inappropriate, unethical, and jarring" misinformation


But the medical processes and descriptions of how the drugs work weren't the only inaccuracies in the judge's ruling.

M. Antonia Biggs, PhD and social psychologist at ANSIRH, told Insider that Kacsmaryk was "perpetuating misinformation and propagating the myth that abortion causes mental health harm" through his ruling.

"What we do know is that abortion does not increase people's risk of having depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, suicidal ideation, or substance use disorders, which is completely against many of his claims," Biggs told Insider. "We also know that people do not come to regret their abortions."

In the ruling, Kacsmaryk writes that women who receive an abortion are at higher risk of death by suicide, "self-destructive tendencies, depression, and other unhealthy behavior aggravated by the abortion experience," citing studies debunked by the broader scientific community, Biggs said.

Kacsmaryk also claims women experience "intense psychological trauma" from seeing an expelled embryo.

Biggs said when she worked on a longitudinal research project called The Turnaway Study, examining the mental, physical, and socioeconomic consequences of receiving an abortion compared to carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term, the results showed the opposite — 95% said that they felt that it was the right decision for them.

"When we did find harm, any kind of psychological harm, it was not to people who had an abortion, but it was people who were denied abortion," Biggs told Insider. "So people who are denied abortion experience short-term, elevated levels of stress, anxiety, and low self-esteem."

Spreading such misinformation through an official judicial ruling, Biggs said, is "inappropriate, unethical, and jarring."

"When you're issuing a ruling that's going to impact people nationally, one would hope that that ruling would be evidence-based and that it would look at the body of evidence instead of cherry-picking studies that are really not in line with the scientific consensus on the topic," Biggs said, adding, "so many of the things in this ruling I would say are completely flawed. It's definitely not going to help or prevent mental health harm or physical harm as it claims – it's going to do the opposite."

Kacsmaryk did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
Harvard Urges US to Unfreeze Funds for Public Health Research
Businessman Mauled by Lion at Luxury Namibian Lodge
Researchers Consider New Destinations Beyond the U.S.
53-Year-Old Doctor Claims Biological Age of 23
Trump Struggles to Secure Trade Deals With China and Europe
Russia to Return 6,000 Corpses Under Ukraine Prisoner Swap Deal
Microsoft Lays Off Hundreds More Amid Restructuring
Harvey Weinstein’s Publicist Embraces Notoriety
Macron and Meloni Seek Unity Despite Tensions
Trump Administration Accused of Obstructing Deportation Cases
Newark Mayor Sues Over Arrest at Immigration Facility
Center-Left Candidate Projected to Win South Korean Presidency
Trump’s Tariffs Predicted to Stall Global Economic Growth
South Korea’s President-Elect Expected to Take Softer Line on Trump and North Korea
Trump’s China Strategy Remains a Geopolitical Puzzle
Ukraine Executes Long-Range Drone Strikes on Russian Airbases
Conservative Karol Nawrocki wins Poland’s presidential election
Study Identifies Potential Radicalization Risk Among Over One Million Muslims in Germany
Good news: Annalena Baerbock Elected President of the UN General Assembly
Apple Appeals EU Law Over User Data Sharing Requirements
South Africa: "First Black Bank" Collapses after Being Looted by Owners
Poland will now withdraw from the EU migration pact after pro-Trump nationalist wins Election
"That's Disgusting, Don’t Say It Again": The Trump Joke That Made the President Boil
Trump Cancels NASA Nominee Over Democratic Donations
Paris Saint-Germain's Greatest Triumph Is Football’s Lowest Point
OnlyFans for Sale: From Lockdown Lifeline to Eight-Billion-Dollar Empire
Mayor’s Security Officer Implicated | Shocking New Details Emerge in NYC Kidnapping Case
Hegseth Warns of Potential Chinese Military Action Against Taiwan
OPEC+ Agrees to Increase Oil Output for Third Consecutive Month
Jamie Dimon Warns U.S. Bond Market Faces Pressure from Rising Debt
Turkey Detains Istanbul Officials Amid Anti-Corruption Crackdown
Taylor Swift Gains Ownership of Her First Six Albums
Bangkok Ranked World's Top City for Remote Work in 2025
Satirical Sketch Sparks Political Spouse Feud in South Korea
Indonesia Quarry Collapse Leaves Multiple Dead and Missing
South Korean Election Video Pulled Amid Misogyny Outcry
Asian Economies Shift Away from US Dollar Amid Trade Tensions
Netflix Investigates Allegations of On-Set Mistreatment in K-Drama Production
US Defence Chief Reaffirms Strong Ties with Singapore Amid Regional Tensions
Vietnam Faces Strategic Dilemma Over China's Mekong River Projects
Malaysia's First AI Preacher Sparks Debate on Islamic Principles
White House Press Secretary Criticizes Harvard Funding, Advocates for Vocational Training
France to Implement Nationwide Smoking Ban in Outdoor Spaces Frequented by Children
Meta and Anduril Collaborate on AI-Driven Military Augmented Reality Systems
Russia's Fossil Fuel Revenues Approach €900 Billion Since Ukraine Invasion
U.S. Justice Department Reduces American Bar Association's Role in Judicial Nominations
U.S. Department of Energy Unveils 'Doudna' Supercomputer to Advance AI Research
U.S. SEC Dismisses Lawsuit Against Binance Amid Regulatory Shift
Alcohol Industry Faces Increased Scrutiny Amid Health Concerns
Italy Faces Population Decline Amid Youth Emigration
×