Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador is urging a federal court to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the state’s abortion ban, arguing the challenge stems from the doctor’s own misunderstanding of the law that safeguards unborn children from termination.
In a motion for summary judgment filed this week, Labrador’s office contends that Dr. Stacy Seyb, a maternal fetal medicine specialist at St. Luke’s Health System, transferred pregnant women out of state for abortions without grasping the narrow exceptions built into Idaho’s Defense of Life Act, which prohibits abortions except when necessary to prevent the mother’s death.
The 2023 law, enacted after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade, represents a cornerstone of Idaho’s commitment to protecting babies. It allows physicians to intervene in good faith when they believe an abortion is required to save the mother’s life, a standard clarified by the Idaho Supreme Court in its January 2023 ruling in Planned Parenthood v. State.
Seyb’s deposition testimony, detailed in the motion, reveals he never read that pivotal decision, which affirmed doctors’ “broad clinical judgment” without demanding “objective certainty” or an “imminent” threat of death. He admitted receiving no training on the Defense of Life Act from his employer and, when pressed on how close to death a woman must be to qualify for an exception, responded: “I wish someone would answer that for me”—despite the high court’s explicit guidance issued a year earlier.
“The Idaho Supreme Court told doctors in 2023 they have broad clinical judgment to provide necessary care,” said Attorney General Labrador. “Dr. Seyb did not educate himself on what Idaho law permits, which is required of every doctor in Idaho. His patients suffered from his lack of understanding, not because of our laws.”
The lawsuit, Seyb v. Members of the Idaho Board of Medicine, was filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho before Judge B. Lynn Winmill. Seyb claims the ban unconstitutionally endangers women’s health by creating confusion over exceptions, but Labrador’s filing portrays it as a baseless attack on a pro-life safeguard that has saved countless babies since taking effect.
As the case advances, it could set precedents for other states enforcing similar bans, bolstering efforts to affirm life.
With the filing, Idaho reaffirms its stance: The Defense of Life Act isn’t a barrier to medicine—it’s a bulwark for the unborn, demanding only that doctors fulfill their duty to understand and apply it faithfully.
