The Cut - Now What?

On Monday night, a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion revealed what many have feared for months: The Court’s conservative majority has privately voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to documents obtained by Politico. While the official ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization — the case concerning a 15-week ban out of Mississippi that poses a direct threat to Roe — isn’t expected until June, conservative justices have not been shy about their eagerness to gut abortion rights. Still, even if the end of Roe, which has for decades guaranteed the right to abortion until fetal viability, isn’t a surprise, that doesn’t mean we were prepared for the news. The best estimates indicate that, if the ruling is overturned, abortion will immediately become inaccessible in at least 26 states, creating a health-care disaster of proportions that are hard to overstate.

As a staff, we discussed our reactions to the news as well as our questions, fears, and anger about the future.

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