Vice President Kamala Harris attacked the legitimacy of the Supreme Court over its decision overturning federal abortion rights.
In an interview with NBC News’s “Meet the Press” that aired Sunday, Harris assailed the court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. She expressed doubts about whether the body can interpret the law fairly.
“I think this is an activist court,” Harris told NBC’s Chuck Todd. “We had an established right for almost half a century, which is the right of women to make decisions about their own body as an extension of what we have decided to be, the privacy rights to which we are all entitled, and this court took that constitutional right away.”
“We are suffering as a nation because of it,” she continued. “That causes me great concern about the integrity of the court overall, especially as someone who– my life was inspired by people like Thurgood Marshall, the work on that court of Earl Warren to bring a unanimous court to pass Brown v. Board of Education. This is the court that once sat Earl Warren and Thurgood Marshall, Sandra Day O’Connor. It’s a very different court.”
Harris went on to press the U.S. Senate to pass a law currently in the works that would take the abortion issue out of the hands of state governments and codify the right to the procedure into federal law.
“I believe government should not be telling women what to do with their bodies,” Harris said. “I believe government should not be telling women how to plan their families.”
WATCH: Vice President Harris says the Supreme Court is “an activist court” for overturning Roe v. Wade.@VP: “We had an established right for almost half a century. … This court took that constitutional right away. And we are suffering as a nation because of it.” pic.twitter.com/rXt8IRPSpI
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) September 11, 2022
Harris’ comments follow months of similar attacks from prominent Democrats who have attacked the Court as “illegitimate” and “extremist” and pushed for aggressive reforms in reaction to the Dobbs decision.
Chief Justice John Roberts defended the Court from such attacks earlier this week.
“The court has always decided controversial cases and decisions always have been subject to intense criticism and that is entirely appropriate,” Roberts told an audience at the 10th Circuit Bench and Bar Conference in Colorado this week. “But I don’t understand the connection between the opinions people disagree with and the legitimacy of the Supreme Court.”
“[S]imply because people disagree with an opinion is not a basis for criticizing the legitimacy of the court,” he added.
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