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June 24, 2022 07:47 AM UTC

BREAKING: Roe v. Wade Overturned

  • 79 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols
Anti-abortion protesters celebrate the overturning of Roe v. Wade at the Supreme Court today.

UPDATE #2: More local reactions coming in via the Aurora Sentinel:

GOV. JARED POLIS: “Coloradans do not want politicians making their healthcare decisions. Because of my administration and Democratic leadership in the legislature, Coloradans don’t have to worry because our rights are still protected today despite the unfortunate reality that the U.S. Supreme just rolled those freedoms back for millions of Americans in other states. In Colorado, we will continue to choose freedom and we stand against government control over our bodies. State leadership matters now more than ever and in Colorado we will not retreat to an archaic era where the powerful few controlled the freedoms over our bodies and health decisions,“ said Governor Jared Polis.

COLORADO GOP CONGRESSPERSON LAUREN BOEBET, 5th CD: “LIFE WINS! Glory to God.”

COLORADO GOP CHAIRPERSON KRISTI BURTON BROWN: “Today is the best day. After decades of so many Americans fighting for every single life, today, the Supreme Court of the United States has finally declared that every child is worth saving and that every child must be protected. This brave decision by the Supreme Court will save countless lives and ensure that the United States is no longer listed among the likes of China and North Korea when it comes to countries with extreme abortion laws. I’m proud to be a member of the Pro-Life Party and the Pro-Life generation. As a mom, I know that this decision is an amazing step towards equal protection for every child. I hope this decision leads to a real conversation – between people on all sides – about how we as a country can best work together to further support our children, mothers, and families. Life is precious. I have no doubt that this is the right decision.”

—–

UPDATE: Rep. Diana DeGette responds to today’s decision:

“We cannot overstate the devastating impact that this horrific decision will have on millions of people across this country. By disregarding fifty years of legal precedent, the U.S. Supreme Court has effectively stripped away from 36 million women the freedom to control their own bodies and have handed that power, instead, to the politicians in their states.

“Every situation and pregnancy is different, and everyone deserves the power and freedom to make their own decisions about their health, lives and future. Yet now, as a result of today’s decision, women in nearly half of the states across the U.S. face a terrifying legal landscape when trying to access the abortion care they need – one that will undoubtedly put the health and economic futures of millions of women at risk.

“For Republicans determined to control other people’s reproductive decisions, this decision is just the beginning of their quest to make it impossible for women to get an abortion in this country. For years, these extremists have been working to enact state laws designed to chip away at Americans’ right to access the abortion care they need. And now, as federal protections fall, these laws, which are already in place in states like Texas and Oklahoma, will soon become law in many other places as well as even more state legislatures move to ban and restrict access to abortion care within their borders.

“While such bans on abortion care affect everyone in a particular state, they disproportionately impact those who already face significant barriers to accessing the care they need – including young people, people of color, those living in rural areas and those working to make ends meet.

“As the leaders of the House Pro-Choice Caucus, we will never give up our fight to ensure that everyone in this country – regardless of where they live – has a right to make their own decisions about pregnancy and parenthood. We trust people – not politicians – to make their own decisions about their bodies, health, and lives.

“And we are more determined and committed than ever to continue doing everything we can – at every turn, and at every opportunity possible – to not only restore the protection that had been provided to us for more than 50 years under Roe, but to expand abortion access to ensure that everyone – no matter their income or zip code – has access to the care they need.”

Local abortion rights advocacy group Cobalt:

For more than 50 years, abortion opponents have been trying to overturn Roe v Wade and the Constitutional right to abortion. Although this ruling may be a shock to some, it is sadly not a surprise to those of us who have repeatedly fought off attacks on abortion rights here in Colorado.

This ruling is what we predicted and what we feared. And it is why we passed the Reproductive Health Equity Act this year, guaranteeing the fundamental right to abortion access in Colorado law. This is why we announced RHEA the day the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in this case on December 1, 2021. This is why we put in the work and the late nights with all the patients, providers, and advocates testifying to the importance of our fundamental Colorado values about reproductive health care, including abortion and contraception.

If abortion access returns to the states, Colorado must remain a place where pregnant people can access abortion care without shame, stigma, political interference, or cost barriers. We are already increasing the funding, patient support, and overall capacity for the Cobalt Abortion Fund for both in and out of state clients.

We currently have RHEA, but that is not enough. This year in the midterms our 175,000 members statewide will hold accountable those legislators who did not support abortion access. And in 2024, we will go to the ballot to enshrine the right to abortion in the Colorado Constitution.

It’s the morning we’ve been dreading; watch this space for updates and local reactions.

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79 thoughts on “BREAKING: Roe v. Wade Overturned”

    1. Expect some gloating from Negev- and some false equivalency – “It’s OK, girls, you get to pack a pistol in your purse! That should make up for being forced to carry all pregnancies to term!”

      1. I will never gloat over the loss of rights….something you could learn from. Tragic day for women's rights and honestly I would be right there next to you protesting today if I thought for a moment you held the same belief…

  2. While extremely disappointing, this can hardly be called unexpected.

    You have to admire the single-minded focus of the right-to-birth folks and their ability to do absolutely anything necessary to achieve their goal (e.g., embracing Donald Trump).

    Our side should learn from this. We will keep losing as long as we refuse to resort to their tactics.

    Oh, and by the way, thank you Ralph Nader, Jill Stein, and their moronic supporters. (You knew I couldn't resist one more opportunity, kwtree!)

    1. You’re a self serving, micro-focused idiot.

      Sexism won today- and it will erode the rights to privacy that you actually care about, for LGBTQ folk, as well as the rights of women for self-determination. ( which you obviously don’t give 2 shits to preserve). 

      When you come after me, expect retaliation at an equal level. You want a truce? Leave me the hell alone, especially today, or at least restrain yourself to attacking ideas and not me personally.

      The same goes for women in the big picture- SCOTUS woke a sleepinng giant, and though they won today, patriarchy will lose in the long run.

      1. Just how long will that “long run” be, kwtree? Maybe it’s time for you to stop calling anyone you disagree with “a self serving, micro focused idiot” and begin to seek out allies?

        The time for complacency is over. No matter the outcome of the mid-terms in November, the radical religious zealots, led by the Catholic bishops and the Centennial Institute, will lay siege to our legislature beginning in January.

        Beforehand, how about counter-protestors at the PP abortion clinic here in Denver? Isn’t it time to let the far right wing religious zealots know they are being watched, and that they are in a minority?

        1. CHB, instead of  patronizing lectures, howsabout you tell me what YOU will do. Are you going to be at the PP clinics? Will you be at the legislature next session?

          I will be in the streets, probably today and in the weeks ahead. So stuff your condescension where the sun don’t shine, or show yourself to be an “ally” in a way that matters TODAY.

          I do seek out allies. People who attack me personally are not, and never will be, allies. 

          1. "Will you be at the legislature next session?"

            The Colorado legislature? What the hell for? They just voted last session to re-legalize abortion. Do you expect that there will be a bill which gets to the floor next year to criminalize it? Or that a bill which gets to the floor will actually pass? Or that Jared Polis would not veto such a bill if it passed?

            Do we need to go the Planned Parenthood clinics in Colorado? What for? Are they being threatened with closure? If so, I will be there.

            The problem this decision causes is immediate and real ….. for women in Texas, Mississippi, Oklahoma, etc. 

            Why don't you jump on your broomstick, kwtree, and fly down the Austin, Jackson, or Oklahoma City where you can make noise where it might make a difference. 

            1. Oh microfocused one, we don’t know what will be on the legislative agenda next session.

              I know CHB lobbies for wilderness and land use policy-  I asked him ( not you) if he would extend that advocacy to whatever reproductive and privacy issues come up next session. There will be some – the RWNJs won’t stop with this court victory. CHB said he’ll give to Planned Parenthood, which is more than you’ve promised.

              I expect you to be in the streets for Pride celebrations this Sunday and civil tights going forward, whatever form that takes. Dominionist Christian Republicans will come after LGBTQ rights and contraception next.  I’ll be there, too. My broomstick works great  for holding a picket sign, and it saves on parking tickets.

              1. "I expect you to be in the streets for Pride celebrations this Sunday and civil tights going forward, whatever form that takes"

                Damn right!

      2. Yes.  Sexism and the patriarchy won today.

        That win was aided and abetted by Ralph Nader, Jill Stein and each and every one of their moronic supporters who willingly traded reproductive rights (and the right to marriage equality and contraception) away in exchange for an electoral temper tantrum.

            1. If the “justice” system weren’t as biased and racist as it is ( yes, I’ll use the R word, suck it up, Polsters), then I’d be for the death penalty for repeat sexual assaulters, especially on children.

               

              However, the justice system is now biased and racist, especially in bringing the death penalty down on people of color, even when there may be exculpatory evidence. So no automatic death penalty for rapists and incestors.

          2. I'm all about looking at the root causes of things.  How did we get here, how can we fix it, and how can we be assured of not repeating the mistakes that got us here.

            And one of the first things we should have learned from this is to not listen to those who helped get us here.

            So shut the hell up.

            2. ESAD. Not shutting up for you or anyone.

              I personally never voted for a presidential 3rd party candidate, always worked for Democrats even the Lesser Weevils. 
              I notice you didn’t answer what you’ll do TODAY. Looks like telling a pro choice woman to “shut the hell up” is the extent of your “ activism”. But have a lovely day.

              1. You want to know something I will do. Make a sizable contribution the next time I get a solicitation from Planned Parenthood.

                Of course, having your built in bias, you won’t believe a word I say. So be it. Put that in yo bong and smoke it.

            3. Root causes of the win by abortion opponents, the result of a diffuse, opportunistic multi-generational, multi-cultural movement, are way beyond a comment here. One diagnosis says we wound up here because activists in the 1960s and early 1970s were impatient to get rights to an abortion, so they went to the court with a plausible case, won with a set of men, and eventually the justices crafted a rationale without clear foundation in multiple lines of Constitutional rights. And a structure that wasn’t linked to medical science, to boot.

              The fix will emerge as usual — a set of people using the available means of persuasion in such a way to get people to act with a variety of their possible realms of action.  If all those who say they are in favor of the ability of women to get an abortion would be mobilized to a single path of action it could happen sooner. If no one spent a discretionary dollar in states that ban abortions there would be economic suffering and things might change in many states relatively soon. Given medical outcomes of abortion and pregnancy, I expect there will be noticeable demographic changes — women moving out of those places where they have a higher chance of death would seem likely to have an impact over a generation or two.

              The quickest change I can imagine are pro-choice wave elections in 2022 and 2024, and state and federal laws creating some right to an abortion.  I suspect that would mean electing enough Senators deciding that abortion rights are able to be passed by an existing filibuster carve out (“budget reconciliation”) or willing to make a new “carve out.”   If necessary, the legislation may need to be protected by stripping federal courts of jurisdiction, too. 

              I’m going to try to be a non-doctrinaire ally to EVERYONE working to assure rights as long as they use non-violent means.  Court suits, legislative action, executive action, those supporting travel access, “underground” abortions and smuggling of medication, mass protests, targeted sit-ins, whatever else people think will help are all fine.  No blame game, no pie-fights, no certainty of what might work better or best … The right to an abortion ought to help us replace the Right.

              1. People will vote their pocketbooks and wallets in November. My hope is that enough voters will see abortion as their #1 focus to be the deciding votes in close races.

                I still firmly believe that Never Trump Republicans helped provide the close Biden wins in AZ, GA, and WI, either by sitting out, or voting for Biden.

                1. "People will vote their pocketbooks and wallets in November."

                  Look at the polling numbers for which issue most people see as most important:  inflation and economic insecurity.

                  The boutique issues:  abortion, gun control, immigration and the so-called "border crisis," LGBTQ rights, and yes, even climate change (which should be the most important issue but isn't) don't come close.

    3. Let me be the one to ruin your "fuck yous".

      I still blame Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton (may her name be cursed forever and ever) for the 2016 Pied Piper strategy that elevated Trump and lose to that clown.

      And I didn't vote for Joe Biden. I voted Green because the platform was my platform, and since then left the Greens, and remain an independent.

      I'll be dropping off my ballot for the primaries this weekend. I chose the D ballot because the R ballot was just all single choices. I voted for Walla over DeGette because I believe it is time for new blood, and DeGette has been hanging around too long for my liking.

       

       

       

       

      1. "And I didn't vote for Joe Biden. I voted Green"

        Of course, you did, you moron. But by 2020, enough folk had learned from their stupidity in 2016 that a vote for a third-party candidate is a vote for Trump. 

      2. If you think "new blood" is timely, under current House rules (and rules likely to stay in place for at least the next 10 years), it means you will be voting for people who have no ability to be a part of the House leadership. 

        After 20+ years of work, DeGette is on the threshold of exercising substantial institutional leadership in the Democratic conference. When Pelosi, Hoyer, and Clyburn shuffle off at the end of this year, DeGette has a real chance to be the Whip, Chairman or Vice Chair of the Democratic Caucus.

    1. His concurrence demonstrates exactly why SCOTUS has zero credibility any more.  I've never been more ashamed to be a member of the Supreme Court bar. 

    2. I'm at work and haven't read Thomas' concurrence. Did he also invite reconsideration of Loving v. Virginia because if so, that would be really interesting.

      1. Thomas claimed that "substantive due process" is invalid legal logic. 

        David Kurtz at TPM:

        It’s been rather tidy to encapsulate conservative opposition to Roe as one decision gone way too far that marks a fork in the road of modern jurisprudence.

        But Justice Thomas’ concurring opinion in Dobbs today makes clear that the true fork in the road for diehards came at least a decade before Roe, with a series of substantive due process cases that protected the rights to contraception and private sex acts and extended all the way to 2015 with the right to same-sex marriage.

        1. Thomas explicitly says to strike down these cases. Here's the Kate Riga article:

          Justice Clarence Thomas bothers with none of that. He says outright that the Court should revisit other landmark decisions — naming the cases that protect the right to a same-sex marriage, to conduct private sex acts and to access contraception. 

          “In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell,” he writes.

          He omits Loving v. Virginia, the case protecting interracial marriage, which is often listed in the same breath with the other three. 

          “Substantive due process conflicts with that textual command and has harmed our country in many ways,” he writes. “Accordingly, we should eliminate it from our jurisprudence at the earliest opportunity.”

          It’s a hallmark entry in the “saying the quiet part out loud” category. 

          The dissenting liberal justices take note. 

          “The first problem with the majority’s account comes from Justice Thomas’ concurrence—which makes clear he is not with the program,” they write, after pillorying the majority’s insistence that this decision won’t threaten other, related constitutional rights. 

          “So at least one Justice is planning to use the ticket of today’s decision again and again and again,” they add.  

      2. Nah, just all the substantive due process cases (Griswold, Lawrence, Obergefell). You can easily predict how he'd see the interracial marriage issue: "Loving involved a straightforward application of the Equal Protection Clause's clear and unequivocal language whereas substantive due process involves something something from whole cloth something something shoehorned something something Framers never intended" etc.

    3. Notice he didn't mention Loving v Virginia?

       

      It would affect his marriage personally if it was overturned.

       

      Both of them needs to be in prison for life due to the 1/6 factor.

       

    4. Thomas is a shitball, but a consistent one. He's always been anti-substantive due process and pro-overruling any precedent based on SDP. (He also thinks the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment doesn't apply to states, such that states can set up their own official churches, but that's a whole 'nother bag of crazy.)

      The other justices in the majority didn't opt to shitcan SDP altogether. I suspect at least some of those justices would like to bring back the old school economic SDP of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, which was used to shoot down all manner of worker-protection legislation.

       

      1. "I suspect at least some of those justices would like to bring back the old school economic SDP of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, which was used to shoot down all manner of worker-protection legislation"

        The good old days of Lochner and its ilk. (said sarcastically) 

  4. I was wrong in the Open Thread – Roberts joined the final opinion for a 6-3 ruling without getting any concessions (except maybe the "nothing in this decision" clause). The Court is now officially fully in the clutches of its radical right reactionary members.

    1. He didn't join in the majority opinion, he concurred in the judgment only.  But he has lost the battle for court credibility to the Five Horses of reaction.

      1. Roberts is correct in saying the Court could have decided the case without wholly shitcanning Roe and Casey by holding 3 months is a constitutionally sufficient amount of time to make a decision and obtain an abortion.  Of course, the Roe/Casey husk that such a holding would have left wouldn't be worth much.

    2. I have already deemed SCOTUS illegitmate since 2000. The only corrective measure at this point is for the entire members of SCOTUS to resign in disgrace and say that they were forced into the Dobbs decision which is the obviously incorrect one.

       

       

       

    3. My mother had 4 miscarriages in between 3 live births. The law you support would have required her to prove the miscarriages were accidental, under threat of criminal penalty. 
      If you want to prevent abortion, you should be all about free contraception and health care…but of course, you’re not. Hypocrisy is your stock in trade.

    4. If women in Houston or Galveston TX want an abortion, they can get one.  If they have the resources to travel to New Mexico or Colorado or some state beyond the others bordering Texas. If they are willing to be "typhoid Mary" that brings the threat of private legal action against anyone who helps them travel or get the abortion.

      I don't have any certainty about the outcomes that will flow from the decision — but I suspect it will diminish the chance of a Republican winning the Senate seats or Electoral college votes from Texas (40) or Florida (30) in 2024 and 2028.

        1. I don't think anyone knows.  The law is written in such a way that the private enforcement does not stop at the state borders.

          SB 8 creates a private cause of action that permits almost anyone to sue a person who provides or “aids and abets” an abortion after approximately 6 weeks’ gestation. This unprecedented provision bars the state from enforcing the law and instead gives private parties the right to sue, regardless of whether they have any connection to the patient or even live in Texas. People who have had an abortion cannot be sued under SB 8 for receipt of such care.

          I've not read of any actual use of the bill or if courts have enjoined the private enforcement.

          1. Colorado will need a statute that will not recognize any anti-abortion vigilanteism happening in Colorado as a result of Texas’ SB 8 and similar statutes in other states. Connecticut already has one, I think, and California is planning one.

  6. COLORADO GOP CONGRESSPERSON LAUREN BOEBET, 5th CD: “LIFE WINS! Glory to God.”

    Or in the words of Aunt Lydia, "May the fruit open!"

     

  7. If the Supreme Court was willing to do this, what’s to say that in 2 years they won’t find that a fetus is a person and abortion is therefore murder?

    we haven’t hit full on theocracy yet…

  8. How did we get here? One stolen seat from Garland to Gorsuch, plus RBG’s seat that could have been appointed by Obama had she resigned before she died.  
    Elections have consequences, but for Gorsuch.

     
    Will this case coupled with Trump’s impending indictment be enough to sway votes to the Dems?  My cynical side unfortunately says probably not (I mean, even Barr and the AZ House Speaker said they’d vote for Trump again.).

    Better stock up on contraceptives and Viagra (since porn will also be outlawed.)

    1. I read a couple of years ago that according to PornHub the redder the state, the higher per-capita consumption of porn. So all those other rights – goodbye. But porn, the Republicans will retain that.

  9. If anyone asks you to solve this problem by voting or donating, you should be clear on one thing: unless they make an unequivocal commitment to you that they will (1) eliminate the Senate filibuster and (2) pack the court, they are fundamentally unserious and will not provide a path to reversing this travesty. The current court will overturn any law Congress passes that upholds the right to abortion.

    Anyone who tells you differently is either in it for the money or is fine living with what happened today and wants to manage your anger so that they can maintain their advantages in society.

    Good luck, all. This is only the first step on this terrible, terrible path.

    2. Respectfully, neither 1) nor 2) can happen without the votes in the Senate. Sinemanch will be in office through 2024, barring the unforeseen. I won't recommend penalizing other candidates if they can't make a promise they might not be able to uphold. If the Clarence Thomas seat becomes available, having Ds in the Oval and the Senate means a lib/prog might replace him, and Sinemanch both voted for KBJ.

  10. Maybe Dems chances will be helped by:

    1) Men who suddenly realize that their chances of having to pay child support went up exponentially; and,

    2) Libertarians who usually support the GOP because of those onerous regulations like workers safety, clean air and water, income taxes, etc. will realize this as true governmental overreach.

  11. Current Court is Sunk in Corruption, Just Like Fox News by Josh Marshall at TPM.

    Always insightful… read Heather Cox-Richardson, Ian Milhiser at Vox or Josh Marshall at TPM:

    The idea that you would create a political movement, harnessed to one political party, dedicated to building up a pipeline of future judges and justices, often all but created in a test tube to overrule specific decisions, was an innovation of the modern conservative judicial movement with no precedent. It had never happened before. And even as judicial liberals have belatedly reacted to that movement, they haven’t replicated it or really even tried. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is the only modern Democratic appointee who was in any sense an activist or associated with a specific rights focus before joining the Court. Even in her case she wasn’t bred for the purpose or ensconced in anything like the right’s incubators of future judicial talent. Breyer, Kagan and Sotomayor are each liberals and have ruled more or less predictably on the Court. But none of them are bred-for-the-purpose ideologues like most recent Republican appointees.

    …

    In the current Court majority we have something very similar. A corrupted, Frankenstein’s monster creation. At one level, give them their due. They had a goal. They worked tirelessly for half a century, building organizations, think tanks, chapters at every law school, political alliances and more all to get to this one day. And they got there. But it is a legitimate Court or judicial body as much as Fox News is a real news organization. And that’s no accident since they are the creation of the same political movement, often literally the same people and the same ideology and mindset.

  12. More from TPM. (Just get a subscription already!)

    This is a Court with a broad agenda to reshape America dramatically, and pre-New Deal America increasingly appears to be the legal model. That includes eliminating constitutional protections against government action recognized over the past 75 years, and greatly enhancing a few, favored constitutional rights. And, just as importantly, diminishing the federal government across the board by tying the hands of federal agencies—which, in our era of congressional paralysis, means crippling the federal government because Congress will not be able to fix the (newly-discovered) shortfalls in existing laws. 

    1. Do a browser inquiry for Leonard Leo, if you've not heard of him. An attorney, he is the brains behind the far right's takeover of the federal judiciary.

  13. We need 2 Senators and say goodbye to the filibuster. Not a carve out but goodbye. 48 of the Dem Senators have said they either support or are open to eliminating it. If we get 52 then we have 50 votes.

    They may retain some kind of talking filibuster where a Senator can stand and talk until they collapse to delay legislation for a day. But after that, then goes to a majority vote.

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