Supreme Court abortion pill ruling: The 9-0 decision isn't what it seems.
SlateThis is part of Opinionpalooza, Slate’s coverage of the major decisions from the Supreme Court this June. “The plaintiffs have sincere legal, moral, ideological, and policy objections to elective abortion and to FDA’s relaxed regulation of mifepristone,” wrote Kavanaugh. “But under Article III of the Constitution, those kinds of objections alone do not establish a justiciable case or controversy in federal court.” However, Kavanaugh also wrote that “it is not clear that no one else would have standing to challenge the FDA’s relaxed regulation of mifepristone.” So for now, mifepristone is safe and will continue to be available for use. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson during oral arguments noted that the case reflected a “mismatch” between the harms alleged and the remedy plaintiffs wanted: “They’re saying, ‘Because we object to having to be forced to participate in this procedure, we’re seeking an order preventing anyone from having access to these drugs at all.’ ” This case should have been dismissed from the onset, since they were “merely speculating about the possibility of a future harm, which does not establish standing under Article 3 of the Constitution,” Lithwick and Stern wrote after oral arguments. Jessica Ellsworth, the attorney representing the maker of mifepristone, argued before the Supreme Court that Kascmaryk’s decision was based on “anonymous blog posts” and data that had “since been retracted for lack of scientific rigor and for misleading presentations of data.” So to recap: This case, which shouldn’t have existed in the first place, was so full of holes that even the Supreme Court’s conservative justices’ hands were tied.