22 July 2021
Mississippi's attorney general on Thursday urged the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, which set a precedent for the constitutional right to abortion, and uphold a state law that bans the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
Why it matters: This fall's hearings on the Mississippi ban could have widespread implications for healthcare, and gives the Supreme Court's "newly expanded conservative majority a chance to confront what may be the most divisive issue in American law: whether the Constitution protects the right to end pregnancies," the New York Times writes.
State of play: The GOP-controlled Mississippi state legislature enacted the ban in 2018, allowing exceptions only for medical emergencies or "a severe fetal abnormality."
- Lower courts blocked the statute, but the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case in May following Justice Amy Coney Barrett's appointment to the bench.
- Barrett has voiced her opposition to abortion in the past.
- A Mississippi clinic has shown evidence that viability — a fetus' chance of survival outside the womb— is impossible at 15 weeks, ABC News reports.
- Roe v. Wade grants a Constitutional right to abortion.
- The court is expected to hear the case this fall and could rule on it in the spring.
What she's saying: Roe and subsequent rulings upholding abortion are "unprincipled decisions that have damaged the democratic process, poisoned our national discourse, plagued the law — and, in doing so, harmed this court," Attorney General Lynn Fitch argued.
- "The Constitution does not protect a right to abortion," Fitch wrote. "Nothing in the Constitution’s structure implies a right to abortion or prohibits states from restricting it."
- "The national fever on abortion can break only when this court returns abortion policy to the states — where agreement is more common, compromise is often possible and disagreement can be resolved at the ballot box."
Between the lines, via Axios' Marisa Fernandez: President Biden could be expected to protect abortion rights through executive action if the court overturns the decades-old ruling, Alexis McGill Johnson, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, told Axios last year.
The big picture: Abortion would remain legal in 21 states and would likely be prohibited in 24 states and three territories if Roe v. Wade is overturned, according to the Center for Reproductive Right's "What if Roe Fell?" project.
- But the vast majority of Americans want to leave Roe v. Wade in place.
- Several states have signed new abortion restrictions into law this year.
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.