New York Governor Throws Tantrum over Roe v. Wade Before Anything Happens
There have been plenty of hysterical reactions regarding the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court by President Donald Trump, most of them revolving around the possibility of Roe v. Wade being overturned.
We’ve seen some of the more febrile reactions already, from Michelle Wolf’s vulgar rant to Charles Schumer’s decision that the Ginsburg standard — not asking nominees their opinions on specific cases — shouldn’t apply in this situation.
No one, however, had a tantrum as delirious as that of Gov. Andrew Cuomo, suzerain of the state of New York.
Cuomo says he’s going to protect abortion by any means necessary, and if the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, he’s going to sue the federal government … a case that would almost certainly end up in the Supreme Court.
Perhaps you may want to rethink this strategy, Andy.
Cuomo made the remarks Wednesday at an event in Poughkeepsie, New York, in which he urged the state legislature to “codify Roe v. Wade,” according to Fox News.
“I will sue when the Supreme Court acts,” Cuomo told the audience.
“We now need to codify Roe v. Wade, which will actually increase the protections in New York. I don’t want any gap in a women’s right to protections,” he added.
“For years, what the Republicans in the (Albany) Senate have said, ‘Well, we don’t need New York law because we have Roe v. Wade and nobody’s crazy enough to try to roll back Roe v. Wade.'”
“Well now we know we’re not guaranteed Roe v. Wade,” he told the audience.
Here in Poughkeepsie to urge the @NYSenate to reconvene and codify Roe v. Wade into state law. We must urgently act to protect reproductive rights in this state.https://t.co/U0VbKlApyY
— Archive: Governor Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) July 11, 2018
If this is how he’s reacting now, just imagine how ridiculous he’ll be if it gets repealed. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near Albany that day.
A former clerk for Kavanaugh pointed out just how absurd this is.
“I have no idea what he’s talking about,” Roman Martinez told Fox News. “I don’t know how you go about codifying Roe v. Wade by suing someone.”
He added that Cuomo’s speech was part of the Democrats’ “coordinated effort to scare people and mislead people about Roe v. Wade.”
He’s right on that account. Cuomo’s speech highlighted something about abortion that liberals don’t like to acknowledge: Even if the Supreme Court were to overturn Roe v. Wade, a decision which inexplicably found a right in the Fourteenth Amendment that simply didn’t exist when it was framed, states would still have the decision whether to keep abortion legal under the Tenth Amendment.
They also neglect to mention that attempts to ban abortion on state ballots have generally failed. Consider Initiative 26 in deep-red Mississippi, a 2011 “personhood” amendment that would have defined life as beginning at “the moment of fertilization.” In one of America’s most socially conservative states, that failed by a margin of 58 percent to 42 percent.
That being said, one can discuss the merits of keeping Roe v. Wade or not, or of banning abortion or not. There are plenty of reasonable opinions about it on either side, although you can likely guess where I fall. However, one of those reasonable arguments isn’t suing the Supreme Court. That someone who made this statement is in any position of power — over one of America’s most populous states, no less — proves just how fundamentally unserious opposition to Kavanaugh’s nomination has become in prominent corners of the Democrat Party.
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