The dust settled and most immediate panic about the fate of mifepristone ebbed Friday night, after the Supreme Court put a widely panned lower court decision on ice for the foreseeable future.
Alito spent his dissent lashing out at his fellow justices who have criticized the Court’s increasing use of the shadow docket — including, notably, fellow conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett — and accusing the Biden administration of being scofflaws, intent on ignoring any unfavorable Supreme Court ruling.
Which is funny as, because Biden is still respecting the Court’s authority.
Waiting for someone to go fIRsT
It’s not the role of judges to redo an agency analysis.
Why don’t Justices know that? Didn’t candidates read the job description?
Alito spent his dissent lashing out at his fellow justices
I propose that instead of the first hurricane of 2023 being called Arlene, we change it to Alito.
Let’s keep this case in limbo until after Nov 2024. Kansas and Wisconsin showed us what women and young voters can do for democracy.
It was politics pure and simple. Rs are already against the wall on abortion and upholding such bs would destroy ANY electoral chance they would have in 2024 and beyond.
So Roberts had no problem convincing all the right wing justices who care about R prospects to sideline the overreach no matter how much they would like to see abortion outlawed.
Shorter Roberts: This isn’t the vehicle. There will be another chance.
I agree. SCOTUS conservites know they’ve caused enough trouble for this decade.
If they were to go along with Kacsmaryk, they’d basically be holding up a sign saying they are “partisan hacks.” That’s a bridge too far, inasmuch as ACB, among others, claims not to be partisan hack.
Thanks Kate Riga, for an absolutely superb piece of writing!
It will be a quick decision overturning the lower court ruling. There is no way that even this Supreme Court is going to decide that it’s their business to micromanage the FDA. That’s a bridge too far for nearly all of them (except Alito and Thomas).
Equally except for the blindered iidelogues who can’t look beyond their pet issue (here abortion), anyone slightly sensible could see that ruling opens up all kinds of cans of worms as a precedent, and cans of worms very much not nice for conservative interests in a long run.
Kacsmaryk served up such a sh*t sandwich that some SCOTUS conservatives couldn’t muster a bite.
An impressive feat considering the terribleness of the Robert’s Court.
The question is Republican Ideologues versus Republican political hacks. And in my view the political hack answer is the worst of all actions the Supreme Court can take as it will create two sets of rules based on what class you are in. Furthermore, as class and race are linked, this means minority women will especially suffer from a political hack result.
First off, what needs to be remembered about the “Roberts Court” before Trump got his 3rd appointment is it was POLITICAL first and foremost ruling in what was best for the Republican Party. No doubt this is what would have happened in Dobbs had it not been for Trump appointing 3 Justices who for a moment were ideologues first and political hacks second.
The question is, and I think likely so, will Roberts find another like soul, political hack first and foremost, to moderate the Republican position on abortion.
The current Republican political line as we hear from several Republicans from Trump to Chris Christie to Chris Sununu is that it should be left to the states. But how do you leave deciding to accept FDA or other federal government agency findings to the states? Obviously, this is not a legal but a political resolution.
If Roberts has his way, I believe that is exactly the sort of ruling the Supreme Court will give even though there is no constitutional or legal logic for this to happen.
Furthermore, in my view leaving it to the states is in practice the worst possible result as it will result in two separate healthcare choices, one for poor women and one for everyone else. That is what leaving it to the states will do is allow women who have the time and money to visit another state to get whatever healthcare, including obtaining Mifepristone, while poor women will be out of luck.
With their lust for power more important than any ideology or power, I predict the Robert’s Court in the end will make the worst possible decision trying to hold onto power and further divide America by creating barriers for poor women to obtain healthcare while mostly adding only minor difficulties to women of some means.
Alito, perhaps the most nakedly partisan ideologue on the Court
Perhaps??
Perhaps??
The tea leaves indicate that the Supremes (and presumably also the Fifth Circuit) will overrule the MTG of the judiciary on the FDA approval issues. So the drug will stay legal.
But I think they may still use the Comstock Act to substantially restrict its distribution. Yes, it is an absurdly relic of 19th century puritanical legislation, but it is still the law, and the Court can put all the blame on Congress for not repealing this (pun intended) abortion.
Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC), who’s been pushing his 15-week federal abortion ban, said on CNN that he’d “live with” whatever the Supreme Court ultimately ruled.
That’s very magnanimous considering this would never effect Miss Belle of the Bawl in any way, shape or form. Ever.
I understand the Comstock Acts and related State laws to apply to USPS. But do these 150-year-old laws apply to FedEx, Amazon, etc.?
The FDA needs to mandate that any pharmacy that does not offer all drugs that are approved and that fails to honor a valid prescription, restricting their licenses. I understand that we need to have greater controls on narcotics and addictive drugs. Every pharmacy that can’t sell them should do whatever regulatory leaps they need to sell them. I’m sick and tired of pharmacists pretending to be priests.
It was about a decade ago that my wife and I had an unexpected pregnancy. She had an IUD, and we had no plans for a fourth child. We didn’t seek an abortion, however. Fate intervened, and the pregnancy ended in miscarriage a week after we learned of its existence. I write about this because of the conversation and the difficulty I had obtaining basic medication to treat this condition in my wife. She was prescribed misoprostol, I think. The odd part about it was that it was sold as a pill, and yet the instructions for use were vaginal. It was an extremely awkward conversation for me talking to the pharmacist verifying that that’s really what they intended her to do.
It’s been 10 years. Is misoprostol still sold as a pill to be taken orally, and then almost always used off label vaginally? Has there been any progress at all in making women’s health more accessible, more reasonably regulated by the FDA, and more dignified?
It’s Alito vs. Thomas for the title of “most nakedly partisan ideologue.”