OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Pro-abortion activists have been furious since the leak of the Supreme Court draft ruling that, if it becomes final, would end Roe V Wade, and many of them have focused their frustrations at Christian churches.
This week one group of women decided to protest at the megachurch of pastor Joel Osteen, Fox News reported.
“My body, my f—ing choice,” an activist with the group Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights shouted in the video that was shared on social media as she removed her dress and was left wearing only underwear.
“Overturn Roe, hell no,” another activist shouted in the video as she took off her clothes. Three total women took part in the protest, where they stripped for some reason.
The women were removed from the church to the cheers of the attendees, but they continued the protest outside with other supporters.
MORE OF THIS đź‘Źđź‘Źđź‘Ź@tx4abortion disrupted @joelosteen earlier. EVERYONE who is applauding these young women needs to join this movement. YES YOU. Donate, put up posters & saturate w stickers, share posts, organize protests, or do something bold like this! Have an idea? DM Us! pic.twitter.com/yrv1lVQUWr
— Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights (@riseup4abortion) June 6, 2022
“I know it seems very outrageous to do it in a church in a private space,” one of the activists, Julianne D’Eredita, said to KPRC 2. “However, the people that are enforcing these laws have no qualms coming up to women in private spaces such as doctors’ offices and medical clinics to harass them and call them murderers.”
“Joel Osteen has an international audience and silence is violence when it comes to things like these,” she said. “We have a very unprecedented and very short amount of time to garner the attention that we need to get millions of people on the streets, millions of people doing actions like we were today.”
The Supreme Court issued three decisions on Monday but the one that could decide Roe V Wade was not among them.
“The justices released decisions in multiple cases Monday, but Dobbs was not among them. There’s now approximately a month left in the court’s current term. A ruling in Dobbs is expected to come by either late June or early July,” Fox News reported.
“The court ruled in three cases Monday. One was a bankruptcy law case involving a trustee for the defunct tech store Circuit City, another was a Florida-based case on Medicaid and a third was a labor dispute involving Southwest Airlines and a worker who wanted to sue the airline over allegedly lacking overtime wages rather than go to arbitration,” the report added.
“The Dobbs case stems from a dispute over a Mississippi law which bans abortion after 15 weeks. Argued in December, the case is seen as the biggest test yet for how the new 6-3 Republican-appointed majority on the court – capped with the confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett in 2020 – will handle major controversial issues,” the report continued.
The looming decision comes as Supreme Court officials ramp up their search for the source of the leaked draft opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade.
The nation’s highest court has taken a slew of actions since the leak, including requiring law clerks to provide cell phone records and sign affidavits.
CNN’s Joan Biskupic provided an update on the Supreme Court’s investigation to identify the leaker:
First of all, remember, this is the most important case of this term, the most important case in many years: the potential to roll back a half-century of abortion rights, and privacy rights. Midway through the negotiations over this case, a draft document was leaked, as we all know, it was leaked from last February. So not only did the public see where the court was headed, to roll back Roe v. Wade, but also it so seriously disrupted negotiations among the justices in terms of where they were actually going to head by the end of June. Chief Justice John Roberts launched an unprecedented investigation four weeks ago, four weeks ago today. Apparently, that has made absolutely insufficient progress, I would say, and they have taken this new step to have clerks sign affidavits.
I’m not sure exactly of the wording, but there would be a denial of any responsibility — and also starting to lay the groundwork for obtaining cell phone data. Now, I should tell you that this private draft went to not only the nine justices, their law clerks — each has four apiece — and then probably about a dozen other people in the Supreme Court building, it goes both electronically and hand-delivered to the chambers. You know, a lot more people could have had this inside the courthouse, but then also if anybody brought it home, the potential for other people obtaining it is great. So they’re focusing on law clerks right now, but we don’t know — at least from the outside — whether it would definitely be a law clerk, it would be somebody else, a full-time employee, anybody else who came upon this, unlikely a justice.
