The Guam Election Commission will be a party in the legal battle over the controversial Guam Abortion Law.

With the overturning by the Supreme court last year of the landmark Roe v. Wade case, jurisdiction over abortion laws is now back with individual states and territories.

Last month, Attorney General Douglas Moylan filed a motion to vacate a 1990 Guam District Court order that stopped the implementation of the abortion ban. That has set in motion a new legal showdown in federal court.

But the abortion law also calls for a voter referendum, and that's where the election commission comes in.

"You are enjoined into this lawsuit because part of the law required the Guam Election Commission to conduct a referendum at the General Election in 1990," GEC Legal Counsel Vince Camacho. "And so you are a party because of that, that part of the law. I don't foresee us really getting engaged in the litigation, because in reality if they lift the injunction we don't have a choice, right? So it's not like Guam Election Commission has a choice. If they don't lift it, we don't do anything."

The board members approved having legal counsel Camacho represent them in court in their individual capacities as commissioners.