Federal Judge Temporarily Blocks Tennessee Law Protecting Minors From Abortion Trafficking

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A Tennessee law protecting children from being trafficking out of state to undergo abortions has been temporarily blocked, with a federal judge taking issue with a single word in the phrasing of the law.

HB 1895 was signed into law by Governor Bill Lee in May. Under the law, anyone who “intentionally recruits, harbors, or transports” a minor to another state for an abortion, without the consent of the minor’s parents, will be subject to a Class A misdemeanor, which comes with mandatory jail time of nearly a year.

Within a month, a pro-abortion state Democrat and a Nashville attorney filed a lawsuit seeking to have the law blocked. According to Rep. Aftyn Behn and Rachel Welty, the wording of the law is “unconstitutionally vague,” specifically pointing out the word “recruit” as potentially violating freedom of speech.

U.S. District Court Judge Aleta Trauger agreed, granting their request for a temporary restraining order against the law. Strangely, in the ruling, Trauger explicitly acknowledged both Behn and Welty’s pro-abortion bias in this suit, including Behn promising she would take minors out of state for abortions, even if she ended up arrested for doing so. Trauger wrote:

Welty is an attorney and “advocate for safe and healthy access to abortion care.” She is “a member of an abortion fund that provides resources to clients who need safe and healthy access to legal abortion medication and legal out-of-state abortion care that they can no longer obtain in Tennessee.” Welty performs most of her advocacy and assistance work in Middle Tennessee, and, while that has taken her throughout the region, she testified at the hearing that her work is largely concentrated in Davidson County and the adjacent counties. Her work is not limited to unemancipated minors, but it also does not exclude them.

Welty’s role in assisting Tennesseans, including minors, in overcoming obstacles to abortion care is well known to the public, and her work has been covered by local media. When Tennessee, pre-Dobbs, permitted some unemancipated minors to obtain abortion care without parental consent through the state’s judicial bypass process, Welty was often the attorney who represented the minor. She says that many of her clients during that period were victims of rape and incest.

… Behn is a social worker, as well as an elected Representative to the Tennessee General Assembly. Behn’s outspoken support of abortion rights has caused her to become increasingly identified with the issue of abortion access, particularly since Dobbs was decided. She testified that her office now receives calls from individuals throughout the state who are personally facing the need for abortion services that Tennessee has made effectively impossible to obtain without leaving its borders. Behn, like Welty, wants to help but fears prosecution.

One of the more striking flashpoints in Behn’s public identification with these issues occurred during the legislative debate on Chapter 1032. The dispute began, as many do, on social media. On April 10, 2024, when Chapter 1032 had not yet passed, Behn posted the following to
one of her social media accounts:

This morning, the TN Senate will vote on SB1971/HB1895, which would criminalize supporting young people who are considering or seeking abortion with mandatory jail time and the possibility of an over $1 million lawsuit.

Should this bill pass, I welcome arrest.

The post included a graphic quoting Behn as saying, “I welcome the opportunity to take a young person out of state who wants to have an abortion even if it lands me in jail.” […]

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