On Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in a landmark case over a law in Mississippi that bans most abortions in the state after only 15 weeks of pregnancy. The case marked another front in the struggle to secure abortion rights for people of the United States who could become pregnant, alongside the ongoing fight against a stricter Texas law that bans almost all abortions. As concerned observers turned their attention towards the Supreme Court’s handling of the Mississippi case, Hillary Clinton spoke out.
Abortion is a constitutional right.
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) December 1, 2021
As she put it on Twitter:
‘We cannot and will not leave our granddaughters a world in which they have fewer rights and opportunities than we did.’
We cannot and will not leave our granddaughters a world in which they have fewer rights and opportunities than we did.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) December 1, 2021
Although the fate of the legal precedent established by the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade was not immediately clear after arguments in the Mississippi case drew to an end this week, leaving the Mississippi law in place would be damaging on its own and could be seen as a green light for conservative officials in other states to seek their own workarounds of the right to an abortion. These threats can be tied to the political machinations of conservative Republicans in the Senate, who refused to even hold hearings for a Supreme Court nominee from then-President Obama as his tenure approached its end but rushed to confirm a Trump pick for the court at a point much closer to that year’s election. That time, they claimed that the fact that the same party controlled the White House and Senate meant that they were free to push through the confirmation process because of a supposed mandate from the voters to act.
Barrett suggesting abortion isn’t necessary because women can just gestate and birth a child and then give it up—a horrific trauma in itself, regardless of the physical demands and dangers of pregnancy and birth.
— Moira Donegan (@MoiraDonegan) December 1, 2021
The New York Times reported that the court “seemed poised on Wednesday to uphold” the Mississippi law, although there’d obviously be no final word on that until the court actually releases its eventual conclusions. The Times did add, though, that “the court’s six-member conservative majority seemed divided about whether to stop at 15 weeks, for now at least, or whether to overrule Roe entirely,” meaning that the precedent could be considered to be on secure footing — for now.
As the Supreme Court hears arguments on a dangerous anti-abortion law, we cannot sit idly by as states try to end Roe v. Wade and move us backward.
I'm calling on New York state to set up a fund that will allow individuals to travel to our state to access abortion services.— NY AG James (@NewYorkStateAG) December 1, 2021
