When pressed about her views on abortion during the confirmation hearings, Judge Amy Coney Barrett dodged. “If I express a view on a precedent one way or another, whether I say I love it or I hate it, it signals to litigants that I might tilt one way or another on a pending case,” Barrett said, in response to a question from Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein about Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, two key precedents on abortion rights.
It’s not at all unusual, of course, for Supreme Court nominees to try to avoid answering questions about how they’d vote on hot-button issues like abortion. But Barrett, unlike other recent Supreme Court nominees, has a fairly clear perspective on abortion, having previously joined groups and signed public statements opposing it. That stance appears to fall significantly to the right of where most Americans are on the issue, and her unwillingness to answer questions about these precedents is a reminder of just how dangerous the topic could be for both the Supreme Court and the Republicans.
Many Americans do support some limitations on when in a pregnancy abortions can be performed, but the public’s views on abortion are complex, according to recent polling data we looked at. And overall, a majority of the public does not want Roe, the 1973 decision that established a constitutional right to