Confirms Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion to overturn Roe v. Wade leaked Monday night was “authentic.”
QUICK FACTS:
- On Tuesday morning, Court Chief Justice John Roberts ordered the marshal of the court to investigate who was behind the leaked draft opinion regarding an abortion case currently before the Supreme Court.
- “To the extent this betrayal of the confidences of the Court was intended to undermine the integrity of our operations, it will not succeed,” Roberts wrote. “The work of the Court will not be affected in any way.”
- “We at the Court are blessed to have a workforce—permanent employees and clerks alike – intensely loyal to the institution and dedicated to the rule of law. Court employees have an exemplary and important tradition of respecting the confidentiality of the judicial process and upholding the trust of the Court,” Roberts went on to say.
- While the Chief Justice did say the opinion “does not represent a decision by the Court or the final position of any members on the issues in the case,” Roberts did describe the document in the report as “authentic.”
WHAT ROBERTS SAID:
“This was a singular and egregious breach of that trust that is an affront to the Court and the community of public servants who work here,” Roberts stated. “I have directed the Marshal of the Court to launch an investigation into the source of the leak.”
BACKGROUND:
- POLITICO published a story on Monday night claiming that conservative Justice Sam Alito had written a draft opinion about a Mississippi abortion case that would effectively overturn the court’s ruling on the 1973 Roe v. Wade case that declared women have a constitutional right to undergo an abortion.
- The news organization’s editor-in-chief Matt Kaminski and executive editor Dafna Linzer wrote in a staff memo that “our obligation, as protected by the First Amendment, is to report the news and inform our audience. Our journalism speaks for itself, and that is no different here.”
