Hillary Clinton.Photo: JEWEL SAMAD/AFP via Getty
Hillary Clintonis speaking out after a draft opinion from the U.S. Supreme Court wasallegedly leaked toPoliticoon Monday, in which the landmark 1973 decision on federally legalized abortionRoe v. Wadeis set to be overturned.
“Not surprising. But still outrageous,” Clinton, 74, wrote in atweet. “This decision is a direct assault on the dignity, rights, & lives of women, not to mention decades of settled law.”
“It will kill and subjugate women even as a vast majority of Americans think abortion should be legal,” she added. “What an utter disgrace.”
Clinton’s post was in response to a “majority draft opinion” of a Supreme Court decision, whichPoliticosays it obtained Monday.
For more on the leaked SCOTUS opinion to overturnRoe v. Wade, listen below to our daily podcast PEOPLE Every Day.
The draft document, labeled as a first draft and the “Opinion of the Court,” also said, “It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives.”
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A decision to overturnRoeseemed likely when the conservative-leaning Supreme Court decided in December to take up a lawsuit over Mississippi’s ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Because allowing the ban to move forward would be in violation ofRoe, the move raised expectations that the conservative majority on the Court would vote to overturn the case.
According toPolitico, Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett were listed as joining Alito’s opinion, while the three Democratic-appointed justices — Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan — are working on one or more dissents.
The Planned Parenthood Federation of America also released a statement in reaction to the leaked draft opinion on Monday, writing, “if this decision issues, 26 states are poised to move quickly to ban abortion, leaving more than 36 million women of reproductive age — and other people who can become pregnant — without abortion access.”
The organization repeated in its statement, “Abortion is legal. It is still your right.”
Politicoalso stipulated Monday that the draft opinion does not represent an official decision from the court, which will only be codified once a final opinion is published, most likely within the next two months. Votes from Supreme Court Justices can change before opinions are formally released, often days before a decision is officially made.
It is not immediately clear howPoliticoobtained the alleged draft opinion, which is noted to have been circulated within SCOTUS in February. The website claimed that it “received a copy of the draft opinion from a person familiar with the court’s proceedings” along with “other details supporting the authenticity of the document.”
“No draft decision in the modern history of the court has been disclosed publicly while a case was still pending,“Politicosaid. “The unprecedented revelation is bound to intensify the debate over what was already the most controversial case on the docket this term.”
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The draft opinion states that the right to have an abortion would remain up to each state, though about half of states have already created laws that would ban abortion ifRoeis overturned.
The potential ruling comes at a time whenabortion rights are under assaultacross the country. In 2021, a record 106 restrictions on abortions became law in the U.S.
source: people.com
