According to Politico, the United States Supreme Court is poised to reverse the Roe v. Wade judgement on abortion rights
According to a leaked initial draft majority opinion obtained by Politico on Monday, the United States Supreme Court is likely to vote to overturn the Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion worldwide.
The unprecedented leak from the conservative-majority Supreme Court shocked the country, not least because the court prides itself on keeping its internal deliberations secret, and leaks are highly rare. The validity of the manuscript could not be verified by Reuters. The White House and the Supreme Court also declined to comment.
The draft, which Politico received, was prepared by Justice Samuel Alito and shared throughout the conservative-dominated court, according to the news source. The draft opinion describes Roe v Wade, the historic 1973 decision that established the right to abortion, as “egregiously erroneous from the start.”
“We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled,” Alito says in the “Opinion of the Court” paper, which is available on Politico’s website. “It’s past time to pay attention to the Constitution and return the subject of abortion to the people’s elected representatives,” she says.
In recent months, states in the United States have tightened limits on reproductive rights, putting them in jeopardy.
Right-wing Republicans have started an assault on abortion, with Democrats, led by Vice President Joe Biden, battling back to defend abortion access. When the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in December regarding a Mississippi law that would prohibit most abortions after 15 weeks, the conservative majority looked to be leaning toward not just upholding the statute but also overturning Roe v. Wade.
The nine-member court, which is dominated by conservatives after former President Donald Trump’s nomination of three judges, is likely to rule in the Mississippi case by June.
Politico emphasized that the document it got was a draught, and that ideas may alter before then. If Roe v. Wade is reversed, the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-choice research organization, claims that 26 states are “certain or probable” to restrict abortion.
