The US Supreme Court granted certiorari Monday in a case challenging the Kentucky attorney general’s ability to defend the state’s restrictive abortion law in court.

The law was originally defended at the trial and appellate courts by Kentucky’s health secretary. However, the health secretary stopped defending the law in court after the law was struck down by the US Court of Appeals Sixth Circuit in 2020.

The law concerns the use of an abortion technique called “dilation and evacuation,” which is common in second-trimester abortions. It was challenged by Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky and EMW Women’s Surgical Center, the only abortion clinic in Kentucky.

Although the court now features a 6-3 conservative majority, they will not hear the question of whether Kentucky’s abortion law is constitutional. Rather, they will determine whether Kentucky’s attorney general is permitted to defend the law in court after the health secretary refused to continue doing so. These procedural questions will have a significant impact on which abortion cases are able to come before the Court in the future, especially at a time when some state and federal priorities on abortion have sharply diverged.

When state agencies appear in court, they generally receive counsel from a division within the state attorney general’s office, who acts as in-house counsel for the state. In this case, the health secretary elected to not continue with the case after the law was struck down at the Sixth Circuit. The Kentucky attorney general, who was elected in 2019, seeks to continue with the case as the sole state actor willing to defend the law. Kentucky law authorizes the state attorney general to defend challenged state laws in this manner. The Supreme Court will determine whether the Kentucky attorney general may properly intervene in this manner.