July 7th 2020

By Bill Berkowitz

The recent 5-4 Supreme Court decision striking down an ultra-restrictive Louisiana abortion law (June Medical Services v. Russo) was a blow to the anti-abortion movement. The Associated Press reported that

Chief Justice John Roberts and his four more liberal colleagues ruled that a law that requires doctors who perform abortions must have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals violates abortion rights the court first announced in the landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973.” However, despite bitter disappointment, the decision will undoubtedly serve as a clarion call for the relentless, long-game playing “right to life” movement to double down on its efforts to re-elect Donald Trump. As Politico reported, “The message for voters will be twofold: The Trump-appointed justices showed they would side with anti-abortion activists, and now they need just one more ally.

Denouncements of the decision came hot and heavy from Christian nationalists. Vice President Mike Pence tweeted, “After today’s disappointing decision by SCOTUS, one thing is clear: We need more Conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court.” White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said: “In an unfortunate ruling today, the Supreme Court devalued both the health of mothers and the lives of unborn children by gutting Louisiana’s policy that required all abortion procedures be performed by individuals with admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.” 

 “We are now on the 5-yard line and this is not the time to quit — it’s time to redouble our efforts,” said the ubiquitous Ralph Reed, a Trump surrogate and co-founder of the conservative Faith & Freedom Coalition. “If Donald Trump is reelected and gets one or two more appointments, we have a good chance of having a pro-life majority on the Supreme Court. If he is defeated and Biden becomes president, we lose that chance for a generation.”

“With this decision, the Supreme Court has prevented Louisiana from enforcing the law to stop abortionists who regularly deride and violate health standards for women seeking abortion,” Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, said in a statement.

Lila Rose, founder and president of the group Live Action, tweeted that the Supreme Court has given “aid and comfort to the genocidal abortion industry which profits from the pain and fear of mothers and the deaths of their children.

Abortion businesses claim to be healthcare entities, but resist any law that holds them to the same health & safety standards as the medical community.”

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion Susan B. Anthony List, said, “Today’s ruling is a bitter disappointment. It demonstrates once again the failure of the Supreme Court to allow the American people to protect the well-being of women from the tentacles of a brutal and profit-seeking abortion industry.” 

Chief Justice R0berts is paying a pivotal role on the Court. As AP pointed out, “Roberts, who had always voted against abortion rights before, including in a 2016 case in which the court struck down a Texas law that was virtually identical to the one in Louisiana. The chief justice explained that he continues to think the Texas case was wrongly decided, but believes it’s important for the court to stand by its prior decisions. 

“The result in this case is controlled by our decision four years ago invalidating a nearly identical Texas law,” Roberts wrote. “He did not join the opinion written by Justice Stephen Breyer for the other liberals in Monday’s decision, and his position left abortion-rights supporters more relieved than elated.”

In the aftermath of the current decision, Heritage Action, which has affiliates throughout the United States and is a sister organization of The Heritage Foundation, one of the nation’s premier conservative think tanks, has stated that it will be “pouring resources into swing states,” Politico reported. “Starting this week, it plans to knock on 200,000 doors in Wisconsin, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Iowa. Soon, it will launch digital ads in Florida, Georgia, Arizona and South Carolina.”

While the decision was the first big abortion case of the Trump era, and Trump and his anti-choice supporters lost, this will not be the last word. There are dozens of abortion-restricting laws winding their way through courts across the country. Changing the balance of the Supreme Court where now the very conservative John Roberts is the current best hope for women’s right to choose, should motivate progressives to organize to vote out Trump with at least the same ferocity as the anti-abortion movement.