North Dakota asks judge to lift stay on abortion trigger law

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — The North Dakota attorney general’s office asked a judge Thursday to lift his stay on a trigger law banning abortion, arguing he failed to make the state’s lone abortion clinic show a likelihood of winning its challenge of the law.

Burleigh County District Judge Bruce Romanick last month granted the request for a preliminary injunction as part of a lawsuit brought by the Red River Women’s Clinic in Fargo.

State lawyers argue the judge made no “findings towards the substantial probability of succeeding on the merits,” which is a factor needed to evaluate motions for preliminary injunctions.

The ban was set to take effect last month. The clinic already moved its services a short distance to neighboring Moorhead, Minnesota, where abortion remains legal, even as it seeks to block the North Dakota law.

Romanick said he was not ruling on the probability of the clinic winning the lawsuit, rather that more time was needed to make a proper judgment.