Kamala Harris has been the presumptive Democratic nominee for US president for less than a fortnight, but some key themes are becoming clear from her campaign. One of those is abortion, about which she has spoken frequently since Joe Biden declared her his preferred successor.
Just over two years ago, the US Supreme Court overruled the 49-year-old precedent of Roe v Wade and withdrew constitutional protection for the choice to terminate a pregnancy. In the June 2022 majority judgment in the case of Dobbs v Women’s Health Organization – the case that overturned Roe v Wade – Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito wrote that Roe v Wade had been “egregiously wrong from the start”. He concluded that: “Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences.”
Under the guise of undoing this wrong, the Supreme Court returned the issue of abortion law to state jurisdiction. Americans have been watching the consequences unfold ever since, as various states have passed laws restricting or banning women from being able to terminate pregnancies.
