US Supreme Court battle: Justice Thomas calls to reevaluate abortion clinic protest rules

Abortion foes have been urging the court for years to overturn the 2000 Hill vs Colorado ruling

The US Supreme Court dealt a setback to abortion opponents, refusing to reconsider a 2000 decision that lets states and cities create protective zones to shield patients from being approached near clinic entrances.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have heard both cases. (AP)

Sidestepping what would likely have been a polarising fight, the justices turned away two appeals that said the restrictions outside clinics violate the free-speech rights of abortion opponents who want to talk to women as they enter facilities.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have heard both cases.

Abortion foes have been urging the court for years to overturn the 2000 Hill vs Colorado ruling, which upheld an 8-foot bubble zone around people when they are near a clinic door.

Although the justices rejected similar appeals previously, the latest rebuffs are the first since the court overturned the constitutional right to abortion in 2022.

One of the rejected appeals involved a Carbondale, Illinois, law that was modelled after the Colorado measure but is no longer on the books.

Carbondale repealed its law days before opponents filed their Supreme Court appeal.

The other case concerned an Englewood, New Jersey, ordinance that works differently, restricting who can come within eight feet of a clinic entrance during business hours. Federal appeals courts upheld both measures.

The Supreme Court last considered speech rights outside abortion clinics in 2014, when the justices struck down a Massachusetts law that created a 35-foot buffer zone around clinic entrances. That ruling was unanimous, but the court divided in its reasoning.