Coons: Access to Contraception, Marriage Equality, Clean Air, Clean Water on the Line After Dobbs Ruling

Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) said Friday on “MSNBC Reports” that the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade meant access to contraception, marriage equality, clean air, and clean water are now on the line.

Coons said, “I was speechless when I heard just in the last hour that a conservative majority on the Supreme Court has struck down a 50-year established liberty, a right of freedom, and has changed the lives of tens of millions of American women, and will make even more unequal access to reproductive health care.”

He continued, “I’m left wondering, what else is next with this activist conservative majority? What other well-established long-standing rights to privacy to freedom are at risk. This is a day I will never forget where I was when I heard this Dobbs decision came down. It’s hundreds of pages. I have not read through it yet, but my understanding from my chief counsel is that the concurrence by Justice Thomas points the way to even more grave consequences, even broader ambitions by this activist conservative majority. So this is a very hard day. I  think this will drive our country further apart. It will make even harder the lives of women whose ability to make their own choices to decide for themselves, their future, and their family will be even harder after this decision.”

Coons added, “The reason I voted against Justice Kavanaugh, Justice Gorsuch, I was greatly concerned whether they would in fact respect these long-settled prescient Roe and Casey, and the underpinnings on which they rest a right to privacy. Something that is as old as I am and has been the foundation on which a whole bunch of other things. Access to contraception, marriage equality, many other things rest on. And as I raised in the confirmation hearings for these justices. I’m also concerned about their ambition to knock out the underpinnings of the administrative state, the ability of the federal government to provide for clean air and clean water, for safe baby formula, and for access to safe food and safe working spaces.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN