21 States, 60 Lawmakers File Briefs Supporting Louisiana Lawsuit Against FDA Abortion Pill Policy

Twenty-one state attorneys general and 60 members of Congress filed amicus briefs in support of Louisiana's lawsuit challenging the Biden administration's eased restrictions on mifepristone, a drug commonly used for most first trimester abortions. The filings came on Feb. 13 after the U.S. Department of Justice under the Trump administration sought to pause the case.

In 2023, the Biden FDA permanently removed the in-person dispensing requirement from its Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy for the abortion drug mifepristone. The Food and Drug Administration policy removed previously held safety rules that required in-person physician visits before the chemical abortion regimen could be prescribed.

Louisiana sued the FDA over the lack of safeguards in October 2025. Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, alongside Rosalie Markezich, sued the U.S. Food and Drug Administration over its 2023 policy permitting mifepristone to be distributed by mail. The case contends that policy was key in enabling Markezich's former partner to acquire the drug and then coerce her into taking it.

In a Feb. 19 statement, Murrill said, "Abortions have tragically increased in Louisiana and other pro-life states because of the withdrawal of in-person dispensing requirements. Behind the statistics is a woman abandoned by an irresponsible doctor who dispensed these drugs without any medical oversight and a baby whose life will be terminated."

The attorneys general, led by Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers, argued in their 21-page brief that the Biden administration's eased restrictions on mifepristone which allowed the drug to be distributed by mail "was a direct attack on these States' duly enacted laws, striking at the very heart of state sovereignty." The brief stated that "the 2023 [policy] effectively permits New York and California doctors to superimpose their views on States like Louisiana, whose citizenry and electorate have charted a different path."

On the same day, 19 U.S. senators and 40 U.S. representatives also filed an amicus brief, saying the FDA violated federal law by removing mifepristone's in-person dispensing requirements. Rep. Chris Smith and Sen. Bill Cassidy filed an amicus brief in support of Louisiana's lawsuit with 58 other members of the House and Senate. They argued the Biden administration's action to eliminate the in-person dispensing requirement for mifepristone was "unlawful."

"The Biden FDA did not have a sufficient evidentiary basis to conclude that eliminating the in-person dispensing requirement was safe," reads the legislators' 23-page brief. "And because no in-person visit is required now, women cannot be meaningfully screened for serious contraindications for the use of this drug, such as ectopic pregnancy."

The brief also raised concern that "a woman seeking an abortion may be facing coercion or intimate partner violence (IPV), and without an in-person evaluation, a provider's ability to discern that is limited." It pointed to the case of Rosalie Markezich as an example of such coercion by an intimate partner. "A doctor did not examine Ms. Markezich nor detect the coercion she experienced," it said. "Her boyfriend ordered mifepristone from a California doctor and coerced Ms. Markezich to take it, resulting in her great distress and the loss of her baby."

In October 2023, under immense pressure and fearing for her safety, Rosalie took abortion drugs that her boyfriend obtained via mail from a doctor in California. Rosalie did not want an abortion, but far from empowering her to make her own choice and preserve her autonomy, the mail-order drugs left her feeling trapped and coerced.

The pro-abortion Society of Family Planning's 2024 #WeCount report states that, from April to June 2024, mail-order abortion drugs—sent into Louisiana from out-of-state doctors—accounted for an average of 617 abortions in Louisiana per month. In December 2024, that number jumped to 800, and in 2025, it went even higher, nearing 1,000 abortions every month.

Mail-order pills, which can be shipped into every state even if they are illegal in the state in question, make chemical abortion easily accessible, with recent numbers showing that chemical abortions make up about two-thirds of all U.S. abortions. According to the Guttmacher Institute, a research firm utilized by abortion providers, 63 percent of first trimester abortions involve the use of mifepristone and misoprostol, medications also used in combination sometimes for miscarriage care.

However, in a Jan. 27 court filing, DOJ lawyers said a safety review of mifepristone is underway, and that such studies often take about one year. The plaintiff's request to end mail-order distribution of the drug, the filing said, "may prove as unnecessary as it is disruptive, if FDA ultimately decides that the in-person dispensing requirement must be restored."

"Plaintiffs now threaten to short circuit the agency's orderly review and study of the safety risks of mifepristone," it said. A DOJ spokesperson previously said that the department was "committed to advancing President Trump's pro-life agenda" and "simply requested more time from the court for the FDA to complete its review."

"As the Supreme Court recognized in a unanimous ruling less than two years ago, it is the role of the FDA -- not the federal courts -- to evaluate drug safety data and impose appropriate precautions," the spokesperson said.

In Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the U.S. Supreme Court overruled Roe and "return[ed] the issue of abortion to the people's elected representatives," allowing citizens and their elected representatives, including state governments, to enact and enforce laws based on their belief that abortion ends the life of a human being. Louisiana was one such state. But the Biden administration's FDA attempted to override the people's choice—and undermine the court's ruling in Dobbs—by permanently eliminating the in-person dispensing requirement for mifepristone, thus authorizing mail-order abortions throughout the country.

Fifty-eight pro-life organizations and advocates also filed friend-of-the-court briefs with the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana in the case State of Louisiana v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration.