
Wednesday’s narrow, pre-trial ruling — from George H.W. Bush appointee Rhesa Barksdale, George W. Bush appointee Leslie Southwick and Barack Obama appointee James Graves Jr. — focused on the challengers’ attempt to hold Planned Parenthood’s national organization financially liable by arguing that the group’s lawyers wrongly advised their affiliates in Texas and Louisiana to continue billing Medicaid while the case played out. The appeals court held that the attorneys can’t be sued by a third party for advice they gave to their own clients. “If private attorneys did not have...