ALBANY, N.Y. — The next decision will be with voters on whether New York will enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution.

The state Assembly and state Senate voted Tuesday afternoon on the second passage of a resolution first passed last July that would protect abortion rights in the state constitution, giving it additional strength in the wake of the overturning of Roe v. Wade last June by the U.S. Supreme Court. It passed both chambers by an overwhelming majority.

After the two separately elected legislatures vote on the measure, it can go before voters as early as this November. But lawmakers will direct it to be put on the ballot in November 2024 — a presidential year in a heavily blue state that would improve its chances of passage.

"Here in New York we will never let the extremist, anti-choice agenda to prevent anyone from accessing reproductive health care," Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said Tuesday at a rally near the state Capitol with abortion-rights activists.

Jan 25 (Reuters) - A maker of abortion pills and a doctor have filed lawsuits challenging state restrictions on the medication, in the first lawsuits of their kind since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the federal constitutional right to abortion.

In a complaint filed in the federal court in Huntington, West Virginia, GenBioPro Inc said the state cannot override the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's approval from 2000 of mifepristone by banning the drug, the first in a two-drug regimen for medication abortions.

The doctor, Amy Bryant, filed a separate lawsuit in the federal court in Durham, North Carolina challenging state-imposed restrictions on obtaining mifepristone, which she said impeded her ability to treat patients.

Many states have banned abortions or made them significantly harder since the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade in June.

GenBioPro, which sells a generic version of mifepristone, said the West Virginia pill ban enacted in September under the state's Virginia's Unborn Child Protection Act "conflicts with the strong national interest in ensuring access to a federally approved medication to end a pregnancy."

The lawsuit said the ban violates the U.S. Constitution's Supremacy Clause, which gives federal laws priority over conflicting state laws, and Commerce Clause, which restricts states from burdening interstate commerce.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico’s top prosecutor on Monday asked the state Supreme Court to nullify abortion ordinances that local elected officials have passed in conservative reaches of the Democratic-led state.

Attorney General Raúl Torrez urged the court to intervene against recent ordinances he said overstep local government authority to regulate health care access, and violate state constitutional guarantees of equal protection and due process.

At a news conference, Torrez said the ordinances are significant even in regions with no abortion clinics because they threaten to restrict access to reproductive health care in people's homes. More than half of U.S. abortions are now done with pills rather than surgery.

“This is not Texas. Our State Constitution does not allow cities, counties or private citizens to restrict women’s reproductive rights,” Torrez said in a statement. “Today’s action sends a strong message that my office will use every available tool to swiftly and decisively uphold individual liberties against unconstitutional overreach.”

It’s unclear how soon the New Mexico Supreme Court might take up the issue. Torrez said he hopes his petition will inspire a quick response within weeks or months.

Gov. Laura Kelly warned Republican lawmakers in her state of the state speech Tuesday night, saying they should steer clear of the conservative agenda they have already signaled on taxes, education policy and other issues.

The speech was postponed from its traditional date during the first week of session after it was believed Kelly had tested positive for COVID-19, though her office eventually said it was a false positive. That meant a "happy birthday" serenade for Kelly on Tuesday, who at 73 is the oldest governor in Kansas history.

The state of the state still included a reprise of Kelly's top priorities, including a suite of tax cuts, increases to special education funding and medical marijuana legalization.

But legislative leaders have already signaled they will largely pursue an agenda that will focus elsewhere, including a flat income tax for individuals and businesses, an expansion of the state's school choice offerings and increased requirements to obtain welfare benefits.

That didn't stop Kelly from repeating one of her now infamous mantras, urging lawmakers to forge a more moderate and bipartisan route.

"Long gone are the days of Kansas making headlines for failure and mismanagement," she said. "Now, because we worked together, Kansas is back on track. Kansas is on the road to prosperity. And the state of our state is strong."

A ruling Thursday from a federal judge that reinstates an abortion ban from 2021 has once again complicated the legal landscape for providers in Arizona.

U.S. District Court Judge Douglas Rayes refused to block a law that prohibits doctors from performing abortions due to the fetus’ genetic abnormality, saying that the overturning of Roe v. Wade nullified that request and no actual harm to providers had yet happened.

Passed by the Republican-majority legislature two years ago and signed by then-Gov. Doug Ducey, the law threatened doctors and others who helped finance an abortion with revoked licenses and criminal penalties if they knew the reason for the abortion was because of a genetic abnormality and it isn’t a medical emergency. Doctors faced a class 6 felony and others who helped finance it could have been charged with a class 3 felony.

The law was ultimately blocked the same year it was passed under the auspices of the constitutional right to an abortion, but the U.S. Supreme Court overturned that right last year and also allowed the 2021 ban itself to go into effect. Because the genetic abnormality ban included a provision that explicitly stated it didn’t supersede the 1864 near-total ban Arizona was under at the time, its reimplementation then was a moot point.

Over the summer, pro-abortion groups including the National Council of Jewish Women Arizona and local abortion providers sought a renewed injunction to block the genetic abnormality ban again. They argued that the law was unconstitutionally vague and threatened real harm to doctors across the Grand Canyon State.

A gunman is at large after he allegedly shot and killed three people at a Circle K convenience store and gas station in Yakima, Washington, early Tuesday, authorities said.

After the shooting at the Circle K around 3:30 a.m. local time, the gunman went across the street to an ampm convenience store where he allegedly shot into a car and then stole it, Yakima Police Chief Matthew Murray told reporters.

It is possible the gunman shot the person in the car as he stole it, the chief said. If so, the driver would be the fourth shooting victim.

Murray called it an apparent random attack. The gunman "just walked in and started shooting," he said.

The motive is not known, he said.

In a move that might give millions of student loan borrowers some reason to be optimistic, Arizona’s new Democratic attorney general Kris Mayes dismissed the lawsuit that had been brought against President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program on Jan. 20, according to court filings.

The lawsuit was filed on Sept. 29, 2022, by former Republican attorney general Mark Brnovich “against the Biden administration to stop its illegal student loan cancellation program,” according to a statement.

“The lawsuit challenges the president’s authority, through the Department of Education, to unilaterally cancel more than $500 billion in student loan debt without congressional approval. The president’s action is contrary to several recent United States Supreme Court decisions striking down federal agencies’ assertion of power never granted to them by Congress,” said Brnovich in the statement.

Biden’s program has been facing several lawsuits since it was announced in August 2022 and has since been halted. In turn, the administration announced that the student loan pause, which was set to end Dec. 31, 2022, will be extended to the end of June 2023, as it awaits the Supreme Court’s review of the program.

The Supreme Court said it would hear two cases regarding the student loan forgiveness program in February. Meanwhile, millions of borrowers are awaiting their fare.

The Florida Supreme Court on Monday rejected requests to halt a law that prevents abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.

Justices, in a 4-1 decision, turned down a motion by seven abortion clinics and a doctor for a stay of a ruling by the 1st District Court of Appeal that kept the law in place. The one-paragraph decision did not detail the Supreme Court’s reasoning.

At a minimum, the decision will keep the law in effect until the Supreme Court can rule on underlying issues in the case. Justices Charles Canady, Ricky Polston, John Couriel and Jamie Grosshans were in the majority, while Justice Jorge Labarga wrote a short dissent.

“In view of this (Supreme) Court’s longstanding precedent, I conclude that the petitioners have met the exacting burden required for this Court to stay the First District Court of Appeal’s decision pending review in this Court,” Labarga wrote.