‘Totally alarmist’: Senate Republican downplays precedent set by Texas judge’s abortion pill ruling

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) on Sunday called concerns about the precedent possibly set by a federal judge in Texas who ruled against the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval of the abortion pill mifepristone “alarmist.”

Moderator Chuck Todd asked Cassidy on NBC’s “Meet the Press” whether he worries about “up-ending the status quo” and the FDA’s authority in a way that could “create sort of chaos in the pharmaceutical industry.”

“I think that’s totally alarmist. It’s totally alarmist,” Cassidy said.

“And by the way, when did the FDA think they could go above the law? It can ignore it – it can ignore the Administrative Procedure Act, which every other agency has to follow theoretically, but they don’t have to? So, so I mean, I think that’s alarmist and I also think that the FDA should not be above the law,” the senator added.

District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, an appointee of former President Trump, issued a stay to bar the prescription and distribution of mifepristone, one of two abortion pills green-lighted for use in the U.S. more than two decades ago — effectively deciding that the FDA had improperly rushed the drug’s approval process.

The Biden administration appealed the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which allowed the pill to remain available with some restrictions on access. The Supreme Court briefly paused the Texas ruling in order to give it time to review the administration’s request for an emergency stay.

Cassidy on Sunday also said the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and handed the regulation of abortion over to the states, was “correct.”

“Dobbs is the uncomfortable middle ground, where people will confront that there is a diversity of opinion. And no one group has the ability to impose their will upon the other. And so Dobbs, I think, was the correct decision,” the senator said.