Attorney General Rob Bonta is seeking $20 million in penalties from two anti-abortion groups over their claims about an experimental treatment.
SACRAMENTO, California — For seven weeks this summer, the state of California sparred in an Oakland courtroom with a pair of anti-abortion nonprofits over a controversial hormone treatment that’s emerged as a critical front in the fight over reproductive rights.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta is seeking $20 million in penalties against the two groups, Heartbeat International and RealOptions, for promoting and providing “abortion pill reversal,” in which women who have initiated medication abortions are given progesterone, a hormone that regulates the menstrual cycle, in an effort to preserve their pregnancies. The state’s lawyers argued the practice is unproven and potentially dangerous and that telling women they can halt their abortions once underway amounts to false advertising and an unfair business practice. The clinics counter that their claims are protected religious speech.
The two sides will deliver closing arguments next week and Alameda County Superior Court Judge Patrick McKinney is expected to issue his ruling within three months.
The impact of the decision could be far-reaching. The case marks one of the first legal challenges to both the validity of the abortion reversal regimen and the growing influence of so-called crisis pregnancy centers, which have become a centerpiece of the anti-abortion movement and...
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