(LifeSiteNews) — A three-judge panel in Tennessee refused to throw out a lawsuit that challenges aspects of the state’s anti-abortion laws.

Backed by the American Medical Association, the suit was initially filed in 2023 by a group of OB/GYNs in conjunction with a group of women who experienced medical issues during their pregnancies. They claim that certain aspects of the state’s pro-life regulation are vague and should be discarded, the effect of which would be an expansion of the situations where abortion would be legal.

Tennessee’s ban on abortion went into effect after the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022. The state’s Human Life Protection Act, which was passed in 2019, served as a “trigger law” designed to ban nearly all abortions. Initially, exceptions for abortion even in cases of rape or incest, or for pregnancies where the pro-born child had health issues, were not included. But in 2023 Republican Gov. Bill Lee added exceptions that would “prevent serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.”

Lee’s revision was not seen as precise enough by pro-abortion critics, who then filed their lawsuit. Judge Patricia Head Moskal, Judge Sandra Donaghy, and Judge Kasey Culbreath sided with them this week and allowed their challenge to continue. State attorneys unsuccessfully argued that a 2025 amendment that added  “medical necessity exceptions” to the 2022 law had made their case irrelevant.

In 2024, the “Underage Abortion Trafficking Act” was passed overwhelmingly in both the state House (74-24) and state Senate (25-4) before being signed into law by Lee. Pro-life groups such as Tennessee Right to Life maintained that the bill was needed because Planned Parenthood staffers across the country have been caught admitting they help female minors secure secret abortions without their parent or guardian’s knowledge.

In a July 18 ruling this year, Senior 6th District Court of Appeals Judge Julia Gibbons, who was appointed by Republican President George W. Bush, stated that the provision of the 2024 law violates the First Amendment by allowing speech discouraging abortion while prohibiting speech encouraging aborting an unborn child.

Pro-lifers in the state remain worried about the future of innocent life in Tennessee. While Lee signed into law the Medical Ethics Defense Act in April, a measure that shields doctors, nurses, and other health professionals from being forced to participate in abortions, he also approved what is being called  “Trojan horse” bill backed by the ACLU that declares a “right” to contraception and embryo-destroying in vitro fertilization (IVF).

“A massive loss for pre-born children in a state that claims to be pro-life,” declared Katy Faust, founder of Them Before Us, an organization dedicated to putting the rights of children over the desires of adults.

“When you look at the numbers that we are able to put together, what we see is IVF, big fertility, the baby-making industry, victimizes about 4 million children every year in terms of violating their right to life,” Faust told LifeSiteNews in February. “Contrast that with abortion and Planned Parenthood, which victimizes ‘only’ 1 million children every year. So, if you believe that children have a right to life from the moment of conception, you have to be highly critical of IVF and you don’t want the federal government subsidizing it.”

Abortion remains broadly illegal throughout pregnancy in Tennessee, albeit with exceptions deemed “necessary” to avoid the mother’s death or “serious risk” of permanent injury to a “major bodily function.” But as LifeSite journalist Calvin Freiburger has reported, abortion groups are working to deregulate interstate distribution of abortion pills, ensure legal protection and financial support for interstate abortion travel, and turn liberal states sanctuaries for those who want to evade or violate the laws of pro-life neighbors, as well as enshrine abortion “rights” in state constitutions.