The "South Carolina Fetal Heartbeat and Protection from Abortion Act" was passed into law in 2021. Immediately afterward, abortion businesses filed a lawsuit to block it. US District Court Judge Mary Lewis issued a ruling to temporarily block the law on Jan 27.
The law would prohibit abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detectable, which happens at the sixth week of gestation. Additionally, the law requires abortion businesses to perform ultrasounds on each abortion patient, display the results of those ultrasounds to women, and offer women the opportunity to listen to the child's heartbeat if one is detected.
Twenty states filed an amicus brief siding with South Carolina's defense of the new law. They argued that the ultrasound provisions could exist separately from the six-week abortion ban, but the 4th Circuit disagreed in its 3-0 ruling.
"These provisions serve to carry out the six-week abortion ban and make little sense without the ban. As such, the district court did not abuse its discretion by declining to sever the remaining portions of the Act," Judge Stephanie Thacker wrote in the court's decision.