The next battleground in the fight to protect human life appears to be the fight to ban the mailing of abortion pills into pro-life states. Two states, Texas and Tennessee, are the first to initiate action against this practice which could have national implications on this increasingly dangerous practice.

The first state to challenge this practice is Texas. Last week, Attorney General Ken Paxton sued a New York doctor for unlawfully providing abortion-inducing drugs to Texas residents in direct violation of state law.

Dr. Margaret Daley Carpenter, a New York doctor, abortion activist and founder of the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine (ACT), unlawfully provided a Texas resident with abortion-inducing drugs that ended the life of an unborn child and resulted in serious complications for the mother, who then required medical intervention.

Texas laws prohibit a physician or medical supplier from providing any abortion-inducing drugs by courier, delivery, or mail service. Additionally, no physician may treat patients or prescribe Texas residents medicine through telehealth services unless the doctor holds a valid Texas medical license. Dr. Carpenter knowingly treated Texas residents despite not being a licensed Texas physician and not being authorized to practice telemedicine in Texas.

Attorney General Paxton requested the court enjoin Dr. Carpenter from violating Texas law and impose civil penalties of no less than $100,000 for each violation of the law.

“In this case, an out-of-state doctor violated the law and caused serious harm to this patient, said Attorney General Paxton. “This doctor prescribed abortion-inducing drugs—unauthorized, over telemedicine—causing her patient to end up in the hospital with serious complications. In Texas, we treasure the health and lives of mothers and babies, and this is why out-of-state doctors may not illegally and dangerously prescribe abortion-inducing drugs to Texas residents.”

Dr. Carpenter claims to be dedicated to making abortion available to women in all 50 states and provides “telemedicine care for patients in abortion-hostile states.”

In a statement provided to the Catholic News Agency, a spokesperson for ACT accused Paxton of “prioritizing his anti-abortion agenda over the health and well-being of women by attempting to shut down telemedicine abortion nationwide,” adding that “by threatening access to safe and effective reproductive health care, he is putting women directly in harm’s way.”

What makes the Texas case significant is that Carpenter hails from a pro-abortion state that passed a “shield law” which prevents pro-life states from taking legal action against abortion providers who violate the laws of pro-life states. The Texas suit represents the first legal challenge to these laws which are springing up in pro-abortion states across the country.

“Thanks to extreme blue-state politicians who shield them, abortionists in states like New York openly violate the protective laws of pro-life states, killing unborn children and sending women to the emergency room in dire condition – all while sitting comfortably thousands of miles away,” said Katie Daniel, Director of Legal Affairs for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.

“We thank Attorney General Ken Paxton for leading the charge to hold out-of-state abortion businesses accountable for preying on Texas’ unborn children and their mothers.”

The trend to fight shield laws in the interest of preserving the lives of women and the unborn now includes lawmakers in the state of Tennessee who have introduced “The Unborn Child Protection Act of 2025” which would levy a $5 million penalty on manufacturers and distributors of abortion pills.

According to Live Action, “The bill’s text makes clear that any ‘person or entity’ mailing or delivering ‘an abortion inducing drug’ into Tennessee will be ‘strictly liable in the amount of five million dollars in damages for the death of the unborn child.’”

Court watchers believe this issue is destined for the Supreme Court where a case involving chemical abortion pills was recently decided.

Kristi Hamrick, vice president of media and policy for the pro-life group Students for Life Action, told Fox News Digital that the high court’s recent decision in AHM v. FDA did not rule on the merits of the case –whether or not abortion pill restrictions should be re-implemented – only that the plaintiffs did not have standing to bring the case. In fact, they made it clear that they were not shutting the door on evaluating whether safeguards on the controversial and sometimes deadly drugs should be reinstated through another case.

"The Supreme Court did not say that everything with the pills was great, they could be sold as they were [and] there were no problems with the pills," Hamrick explained to Fox. "What the Supreme Court said is you need to go back and start again, you've come to us with the wrong victims, they didn't have what the court called ‘standing.’"

In the Texas case, "The state has a right to defend its laws. So, the state, on the face of it, has a right to defend itself and its laws and the laws of its citizens and its duly elected representatives,” Hamrick said. “So, yeah, they have standing.”

As Daniels says, we can only hope and pray that AG Paxton’s example “will embolden other pro-life leaders and begin the undoing of the mail-order abortion drug racket.”

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