May 2026

We are glad to celebrate a victory for plaintiff Lisa Sobel and the other Jewish women who have fought Kentucky’s abortion ban for over three years. Last week, Jefferson Circuit Judge Brian Edwards struck down the state’s statutory definition of human life, which defined a “human being” as a person from “fertilization to full gestation and childbirth,” as unconstitutionally vague. The ruling clears the way for the plaintiff and other Kentuckians to pursue IVF without fear of criminal prosecution for discarding non-viable embryos.

As Sobel stated after the ruling: “IVF is how my husband and I became parents. It is part of our family’s story. And anyone who has lived through it knows it already asks so much of you...No one going through that should also have to ask, ‘Could the state prosecute me for this?’”

The victory, however, is incomplete. Judge Edwards rejected the plaintiffs’ religious freedom claims, concluding that Kentucky’s Human Life Protection Act (HLPA) is “religiously neutral” and does not specifically burden the Jewish claimants on account of their faith. But this analysis applies the wrong test: Sobel had challenged the HLPA under Kentucky’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which creates a right to exemptions from laws that conflict with religious practice even if they are religiously neutral. 

As Christine Ryan, LRRP’s Senior Fellow for Reproductive Rights, noted: “I hope the religious freedom portion of this ruling will be appealed. The court’s failure to properly apply the RFRA test is a serious error. Abortion restrictions and fetal personhood laws  impose real and substantial burdens on people whose faith compels them to seek, provide, or facilitate abortion services, and courts must take those claims seriously.” 

This case is part of a wave of faith-based challenges to abortion restrictions across the country, where Jewish, Christian, and other religious plaintiffs argue that state abortion bans impermissibly impose one religion’s view of personhood onto believers who hold different, sincerely held convictions. The Law, Rights and Religion Project will continue to track and support this litigation.

“We have known for years that restricting abortion care at hospitals creates profound risks for pregnant patients. Published last week, a new study from Johns Hopkins and UCLA found a 9.2% rise in pregnancy-associated mortality in states with abortion bans.

For faith leaders, advocates, and attorneys trying to understand the impact of hospital abortion restrictions, LRRP’s work on religious hospitals remains as relevant as ever.”

— Dr. Christine Ryan, Senior Fellow for Reproductive Rights

A new study published in the American Journal of Public Health shows what abortion bans may be costing in human lives: an estimated 9.2% increase in pregnancy-associated deaths above expectation across 14 states that enacted abortion bans following the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

While the cause of this increase is not definitive, LRRP’s work has for years demonstrated the profound risks of limiting abortion care–whether through a state ban or a hospital policy. In 2019, our Bearing Faith report showed how strict anti-abortion policies at Catholic hospitals–which make up one in six hospital beds in the U.S.–had a disproportionate impact on women of color. Our 2021 Southern Hospitals Report found similar abortion bans at both Protestant and secular hospitals across the U.S. South. These policies led to delays and denials of care for patients facing health issues ranging from cancer to lethal fetal anomalies to mental health crises.

Abortion bans have only exacerbated these longstanding problems. Before Dobbs, patients denied care because of a hospital policy could, at least some of the time, seek care elsewhere. Such religious hospital “workarounds” were detailed in Not Here or There: How Catholic Hospital Abortion Bans Interact with State Bans, co-authored by LRRP Director Liz Reiner Platt, Dr. Lori Freedman, and Dr. Debra Stulberg last year. In Not Here or There, we warned that without such workarounds, more patients would suffer worse consequences from being turned away. The Johns Hopkins study’s findings are consistent with that prediction: when patients have nowhere to turn, the consequences are dire.

LRRP Resources on Reproductive Rights and Religious Liberty

• Not Here or There: How Catholic Hospital Abortion Bans Interact with State Bans: The full legal and policy analysis of what happens when institutional restriction and state law converge.

• The Southern Hospitals Report: Documenting the pre-Dobbs landscape of denial and delay in Southern states.

• A Religious Right to Abortion: Legal History and Analysis: The foundational LRRP resource on RFRA-based challenges to abortion bans.

More from LRRP

LRRP Director Liz Reiner Platt recently joined Prof. David Lopez of Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law for a conversation on the use of religion law claims to resist immigration enforcement. The episode, part of a special series from ASU Law’s Civil Rights Migration and Workplace Law Initiative, covers the legal landscape LRRP has been tracking: what RFRA protects, what the ongoing sensitive locations litigation has established, and what resources are available to faith communities and attorneys navigating these questions in real time.

The 43-minute episode is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all other major platforms.

The Law, Rights and Religion Project at Union Theological Seminary works to advance a vision of religious liberty that protects everyone—not just those with the most political power. If this newsletter was forwarded to you, you can subscribe here.