Supreme Courtroom says leaked abortion draft is authentic; Roberts orders investigation into leak

Pro-abortion and anti-abortion demonstrators protest exterior the U.S. Supreme Court after the leak of a draft majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito making ready for a majority of the court docket to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion rights determination later this 12 months, in Washington, U.S., Might 3, 2022. 

Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts on Tuesday confirmed the authenticity of a leaked draft court docket opinion that may toss out longstanding abortion rights, but famous that is not the court's final resolution.

Roberts ordered an investigation into the leaker.

"To the extent this betrayal of the confidences of the Court docket was meant to undermine the integrity of our operations, it will not succeed," the chief justice said in a statement. "The work of the Court docket won't be affected in any manner."

"I have directed the Marshal of the Court docket to launch an investigation into the source of the leak," Roberts stated.

The advance publication of a draft opinion is nearly unprecedented for the high court docket, the place leaks of any form are exceedingly rare.

The court docket shares drafts of opinions internally long before they are issued publicly, Roberts noted, calling it "a routine and essential part of the Courtroom's confidential deliberative work."

The draft in this high-profile abortion case was created in February, in line with Politico, which obtained the opinion.

The justices, law clerks and different staff of the court are "intensely loyal to the establishment and devoted to the rule of regulation," Roberts stated.

"Court staff have an exemplary and essential custom of respecting the confidentiality of the judicial course of and upholding the trust of the Courtroom. This was a singular and egregious breach of that trust that's an affront to the Courtroom and the community of public servants who work right here," he mentioned.

The publication of the draft opinion rocked Washington, triggering waves of shock and fury from Democrats who are actually pushing for Congress to right away codify abortion rights by legislation.

Republicans decried the leak itself, and plenty of known as for the form of investigation the Roberts introduced late Tuesday morning. The GOP lawmakers who commented on the draft opinion praised it for placing decisions about abortion in the fingers of states as an alternative of the federal government.

The 98-page draft opinion was penned by Justice Samuel Alito, one in every of six conservatives on a courtroom that has moved sharply to the right in the wake of the Trump administration.

Alito's draft would toss out the precedent set by the 1973 case Roe v. Wade and reaffirmed in 1992 by Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Those pivotal rulings protect the right to get an abortion before the point of fetal viability and require that regulations limiting abortion access don't pose an "undue burden."

Alito wrote: "We maintain that Roe and Casey must be overruled."

The draft of the opinion of the court in Dobbs v. Jackson Ladies's Well being Group would facet with the state of Mississippi in defense of a legislation that would ban virtually all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.

Decrease federal courts had blocked the regulation on the grounds that it violates the protections established by the Roe and Casey decisions.

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