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DOJ Orders U.S. Marshals Service To Bolster Security At Homes of SCOTUS Justices

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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.


As protesters continue to ‘walk by’ homes of some U.S. Supreme Court justices in protest of their previous decision to side with overturning Roe v. Wade, Attorney General Merrick Garland is finally acting.

After days of such protests, which are reportedly against federal law, Garland has ordered the U.S. Marshals Service to boost security at the home of those justices being targeted by left-wing pro-abortion groups and individuals.

“Attorney General Garland continues to be briefed on security matters related to the Supreme Court and Supreme Court Justices. The Attorney General directed the U.S. Marshals Service to help ensure the Justices’ safety by providing additional support to the Marshal of the Supreme Court and Supreme Court Police,” the Justice Department announced on Wednesday.

The Washington Examiner noted that it’s not clear what types of security measures are going to be implemented, adding:

The move comes amid a bevy of protests outside several Justices’ homes demanding the court reverse course and keep abortion rights enshrined in the high court’s interpretation of the Constitution.

The draft decision is not a final ruling. It shows the court plans to overturn the precedents set in Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey that guaranteed women a constitutional right to an abortion, relegating the contentious issue back to the states.

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The draft opinion that was leaked last week to POLITICO, which was unprecedented, was written by Justice Samuel Alito. Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett signed on to it.

Chief Justice John Roberts, nominally the high court’s sixth conservative who often votes with the liberal minority, reportedly is lobbying the five to change their minds and only rule to uphold the Casey case, which stems from a Mississippi law banning abortions after 15 weeks.

A report earlier this week, citing some conservative sources close to the court, said that the five justices are holding firm, however.

Fox News reports:

The leaked draft majority opinion penned by Alito is dated Feb. 10 and has almost certainly changed multiple times in the almost three months since it was written, but three conservative sources close to the court say that the votes supporting the decision remain unchanged, according to reporting from the Washington Post.

Chief Justice John Roberts, who has at times sided with the liberal wing of the court, still appears set to oppose the decision, with the report noting that Roberts was still attempting to persuade Coney Barrett and Kavanaugh to take a more incremental approach to allow abortion restrictions.

The court’s three liberals — Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan — are expected to vehemently oppose the ruling. It’s not clear if Roberts is attempting to persuade them to his incremental view.

The draft was leaked to POLITICO, which published it a week ago Monday.

The draft opinion is a full-throated, unflinching repudiation of the 1973 decision which guaranteed federal constitutional protections of abortion rights and a subsequent 1992 decision – Planned Parenthood v. Casey – that largely maintained the right,” the outlet reported.

In the “Opinion of the Court,” Alito wrote: “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start.”

“We, therefore, hold the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion. Roe and Casey must be overruled, and the authority to regulate abortion must be returned to the people and their elected representatives,” he added.

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POLITICO noted further:

Deliberations on controversial cases have in the past been fluid. Justices can and sometimes do change their votes as draft opinions circulate and major decisions can be subject to multiple drafts and vote-trading, sometimes until just days before a decision is unveiled. The court’s holding will not be final until it is published, likely in the next two months.

No draft decision in the modern history of the court has been disclosed publicly while a case was still pending. The unprecedented revelation is bound to intensify the debate over what was already the most controversial case on the docket this term.

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