MSNBC’s Lithwick: Dobbs Ruling Means U.S. Split into ‘Two Countries’ — Won’t Say ‘Civil War’ but ‘Immense Bickering’

In reaction to the Supreme Court overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling, MSNBC law and politics analyst Dahlia Lithwick suggested the United States would be split into “two countries” with abortion laws being sent to the states.

Lithwick said on MSNBC’s “José Díaz-Balart Reports” that she did not want to refer to the split over abortion as a “civil war” but acknowledged there would be “immense, immense bickering about where states can control conduct of other states.”

“You know, it’s interesting. What it’s going to mean is that there are two countries; that there are quite literally red states and blue states,” Lithwick explained. “And we’re already seeing red states making efforts to reach out into blue states and say we’re going preclude you from performing abortions, either by shuttering your clinics, trying to bankrupt your clinic. We’re already seeing fights going on about red states that are going to want to make it impossible for people to travel interstate to get this basic health care. And I think we’re going to see blue states like Connecticut passing laws to try to shield their own providers from liability in red states.”

“So, in some sense, I think we are looking at a sort of a constitutional legal — I don’t want to use the word civil war — but I think we’re going to see immense, immense bickering about where states can control conduct of other states,” she continued. “In some ways, it is sort of representative of where we are right now, but I think it really, really puts to the lie Justice Kavanaugh’s notion that if we kick this back to the states, everyone will chill out and be happy.”

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