The aftershocks are just beginning |
Just moments after the Supreme Court delivered its seismic ruling overturning Roe, Missouri became the first state to effectively outlaw abortion, with the swift signature of the state’s attorney general certifying the ruling.
In Washington, on the steps of the nation’s highest court, abortion advocates and opponents — both wielding signs with sparring messages — filled the air with a mix of elated cheers and exasperated chants of “I will aid and abet abortion.”
Justice Samuel Alito suggested in his majority opinion that it would be impossible to foresee what would happen in the wake of the decision, but the cascading effects are already on full view. Even before the ruling, 22 states were poised to ban or fully curtail access to abortion.
Nearly a dozen have now done so.
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The decision to strip Americans of their constitutional right to abortion — augured by former President Donald Trump’s appointment of three justices, tilting the court to its most conservative posture in 75 years — is now setting off a flurry of sweeping prognoses about the future of reproductive rights in America: - Doctors, who take an oath to “do no harm,” are caught in an impossible legal and ethical gauntlet. The decision is now forcing them to ponder “how imminent must death be,” as one OB-GYN put it, for pregnant patients who need the procedure because of life-threatening complications.
- The ruling will likely disproportionately affect people with disabilities and women of color — and heighten the risks of people falling deeper into poverty. People with disabilities are over three times more likely than non-disabled people to be sexually assaulted, according to federal statistics — putting them at high risk of needing access to the procedure. Black and Hispanic women seek abortions at higher rates than their peers in conservative states, and financial constraints may prevent them from traveling for care. And a landmark study that followed women for a decade found those denied an abortion were four times more likely to be living in poverty years later. Data shows the potential consequences don’t stop there.
- States where abortions remain protected are already worried about the demand from out-of-state patients. Minnesota, currently an island in a sea of abortion bans, has just eight clinics that provide the procedure. Wait times can last two weeks, pushing some patients outside the window of viability. One nonprofit says the cost of care can exceed $1,000 — inevitably widening the chasm in access among the rich and poor.
- Restrictive abortion laws could lead to a wave of mass incarceration. A woman charged with murder for having a miscarriage, and awaiting her fate in front of a court of law, is now no longer just a hypothetical. The laws could give rise to a legal trawl net targeting patients who seek abortions — and those who aid them — that is tantamount to the War on Drugs, experts say. Lawyers are already gearing up for a fight.
The unraveling of nearly a half-century of precedent will play out more clearly in the months and years ahead. But one thing is certain, as our Nina Totenberg noted: The Supreme Court no longer has a center. Could it tear through other enshrined American rights? Only time holds the answers.
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| — Dylan Scott, NPR audience editor |
Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images |
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