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WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) – Sixty-seven members of Congress signed an amicus brief in support of a pro-life lawsuit against the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) for disregarding the law to deregulate chemical abortions, in the process endangering the very women the move was presented as serving.

The Biden administration has taken numerous actions to ease abortion “access” both before and after last June’s overturn of Roe v. Wade, including the FDA eliminating the requirement that abortion pills only be dispensed in-person to the women taking them.

Represented by Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), Americans United for Life (AUL) is suing the FDA over the decision, arguing that it “never studied the safety of the drugs under the labeled conditions of use, ignored the potential impacts of the hormone-blocking regimen on the developing bodies of adolescent girls, disregarded the substantial evidence that chemical abortion drugs cause more complications than surgical abortions, and eliminated necessary safeguards for pregnant girls and women who undergo this dangerous drug regimen.”

On Monday, Senate Pro-Life Caucus Chair Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS) and Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX) announced they are leading an amicus brief in support of the lawsuit, signed by 13 Senate and 54 House Republicans.

“By subverting the FFDCA’s [Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act’s] patent safeguards, the FDA is playing a dangerous game with the health and safety of women and girls, which is why the FDA’s approval and deregulation of chemical abortion pills should be preliminarily enjoined,” the brief argues. “Contrary to the FDA’s assertion, adolescent patients seeking chemical abortions face unique challenges that place them in dissimilar conditions to adult women, and waiving the pediatric rule jeopardizes the health and safety of adolescent patients […] Notably, the FDA authorized chemical abortion drugs without knowing the drugs’ impact on adolescent development, especially its effect on girls’ immune systems.”

“Federal law bars the use of the United States Postal Service and private carriers from mailing abortion-inducing drugs, including the chemical abortion regimen of mifepristone and misoprostol,” the brief continues. “By contravening federal law to allow telemedicine and mail order chemical abortion pills, the FDA is endangering women’s health and safety.”

“These facts provide a clear legal basis to hold the FDA accountable for abdicating its responsibility to protect the American people from these dangerous drugs and for overstepping its authority under the law,” Hyde-Smith said.

“The Biden Administration’s decision to allow dangerous life-ending chemical abortion drugs to be ordered online or purchased in a store without proper medical consultation or oversight is blatantly putting politics over the safety of women,” Pfluger added. “It is unacceptable to see the politicization of the Food and Drug Administration, which is tasked with ensuring products are safe for Americans.”

A 2020 open letter from a coalition of pro-life groups to then-FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn noted that the FDA’s own adverse reporting system says the “abortion pill has resulted in over 4,000 reported adverse events since 2000, including 24 maternal deaths. Adverse events are notoriously underreported to the FDA, and as of 2016, the FDA only requires abortion pill manufacturers to report maternal deaths.”

Pro-lifers argue that with the Biden administration completely eliminating the requirement that abortion pills be taken under any medical supervision, those events are certain to increase.

Yet the White House and the abortion lobby have determined that, with the overturn of Roe restoring states’ ability to decide their own abortion laws, easy distribution of abortion pills will be one of their chief methods of preserving abortion “access.” In November 2022, Operation Rescue reported that a net decrease of 36 abortion facilities in 2022 has led to the lowest number in almost 50 years, but the chemical abortion business has “surged,” with 64 percent of new facilities built last year specializing in dispensing mifepristone and misoprostol.

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