In an extraordinary development, Politico has obtained a draft of a majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito indicating that the high court “has voted to strike down the landmark Roe v. Wade decision,” officially making abortion illegal in the United States.
In the draft opinion, Alito writes that “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled,” according to Politico. “The Constitution makes no reference to abortion and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision.”
The conservative judge said that Roe was “egregiously wrong from the start” and that its reasoning was “exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences.”
He added: “It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s representatives.”
According to the document, the Supreme Court would overturn Roe v. Wade’s holding of a federal constitutional right to an abortion. The opinion would be the most consequential abortion decision in decades and transform the landscape of women’s reproductive health in America.
The leak of the draft is a stunning breach of Supreme Court confidentiality, and Politico’s publishing of the draft is unprecedented by the high court’s standards of secrecy. The inner deliberations among the justices while opinions are being drafted and votes are being settled are among the most closely held details in Washington.
Read the draft of the conservative majority opinion below:
