And it’s far from alone. South Dakota’s attorney general predicted in 2011 that a law passed that year would cost anywhere from $1.75 million to $4 million to defend. And last summer, the Argus Leader reported that the state had, to that point, spent $378,000 in defense of a separate 2005 abortion law.
Kansas has spent $769,000 defending abortion limits from January 2011 to June of this year, according to the Associated Press. The state’s attorney general predicted an additional $500,000 cost over the next two years.
And in North Dakota, Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem (R) was given a $400,000 fund to draw from to defend that state’s abortion restrictions.