A California doctor has been sued for the first time under a Texas law that allows private citizens to pursue medical professionals who provide abortion pills.
Jerry Rodriguez lives in Texas. lawsuit On Sunday, a lawsuit was filed against California family doctor Remy Coeito for allegedly prescribing abortion pills to an alleged sexual partner. He is trying to stop doctors from distributing the drugs and plans to sue for economic damages if he finds evidence that Koeito violated the law.
Related: Texas passes bill to ban abortion pills from being mailed to the state
“This law goes against everything Texans hold dear: it’s anti-freedom, it’s anti-privacy, it’s anti-family,” said Mark Herron, associate director of litigation at the Center for Reproductive Rights, which is representing Koeito. statement. “Yet, these lawmakers are relentless in their efforts to intimidate doctors and patients from prescribing or obtaining abortion pills, precisely because they are so safe, so effective, and so widely used across the United States.”
Texas passed House Bill 7 It would allow private citizens to sue for at least $100,000 in damages against anyone who “manufactures, distributes, mails, transports, delivers, prescribes, or provides” abortion pills. Such laws are commonly known as “bounty hunting” bills because they encourage civilians to cross state lines to participate in vigilante operations.
Not only is abortion legal in California, there is a shield law that prevents states that ban abortion care from penalizing California health care providers and their patients. The law, signed by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2022, prohibits information release, arrest and extradition based on court orders from other states, and prohibits law enforcement from assisting other jurisdictions in prosecuting Californians.
Texas and Florida filed a joint lawsuit. lawsuit It filed a lawsuit against the Food and Drug Administration in December over approval of mifepristone, joining two other lawsuits filed by Missouri and Louisiana in 2025. The lawsuit challenges not only the FDA’s approval of abortion pills, but also the policy that allows the pills to be mailed.
Related: Florida and Texas launch ‘legal attack’ seeking nationwide restrictions on abortion drugs
Mifepristone is used in two-thirds (63 percent) of abortions in the United States, according to a 2024 report study From the Guttmacher Institute. separate report As of June 2025, more than a quarter (27%) of abortions in the United States were provided via telemedicine using mifepristone, according to a study by the Family Planning Association.
“Texas authorities are already searching for doctors outside our borders, and now they are encouraging civilians to follow their orders,” said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights. “This law is one of many aimed at cutting off access to abortion pills, a lifeline for American women post-Roe. Anti-abortion opponents have launched an all-out attack on abortion pills in the courts, Congress, and within the FDA. People need to wake up to the fact that the anti-abortion movement is doing everything it can to remove mifepristone from the national market or make it much more difficult to obtain.”
Source: Advocate.com – www.advocate.com
