Extremist right-wing Supreme Court justices voted to overturn Roe v. Wade on Friday, the result of the far right’s decades-long disinformation and funding campaign to restrict bodily autonomy and the right to an abortion in the U.S.
The Court ruled 6 to 3 to overturn 50 years of precedent set by Roe, the landmark 1973 ruling that established abortion protections across the country. This decision will have wide-reaching and devastating consequences for the nation’s 330 million people. At least 26 states are certain or likely to ban abortion now that Roe is gone, and health experts have said that many people will die as a result.
Conservative Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett ruled as the majority. Chief Justice John Roberts filed a concurring judgment with the majority. Dissenting from the opinion were Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.
The decision, written by Justice Alito, is riddled with anti-abortion talking points, including the viewpoint that, because the Constitution doesn’t directly discuss abortion, it is not a protected right.
“The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision,” Alito wrote.
This story is breaking and will be updated.
