Biden: Gun and abortion rulings no reason to change Supreme Court | Abroad

The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that Americans have a constitutional right to carry a firearm outdoors, which states like New York and California had largely banned. On Friday, the court ruled that there is no federal right to abortion, but that it is up to states to make their own decisions. Abortion is expected to become illegal immediately or in the near future in 26 states.

For some time now, the US has been calling for an extension of the Supreme Court, in order to get rid of the majority of the conservative members, who occupy six of the nine seats in the court. Senator Elizabeth Warren, among others, called for it last year. The US Constitution says nothing about the number of members the Supreme Court must have. The number of members has changed six times in history and stands at nine since 1869.

Abortion Oral

Although Biden does not plan to expand the court, he is looking for solutions to lapse the right to abortion, a spokesman said. Presidential decrees that Biden can issue to improve the situation are being looked into. But no decree can “fill the hole left by this ruling” of the court, its spokesman warns. “That can only be filled if Congress decides to act.”

Biden had already called on the US parliament in a speech on Friday to pass laws that establish the right to abortion.

Democrats in minor

Several US senators have expressed disappointment over Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch. Both are conservative members of the Supreme Court who voted Friday to repeal abortion rights, though before nomination they appeared to suggest they wouldn’t. That reports The New York Times.

Republican Senator Susan Collins spoke for two hours in 2018 with Kavanaugh, who faced a difficult Senate nomination after a woman accused him of rape. Collins ended up being one of the crucial voices for Kavanaugh after promising her he would not revoke abortion rights. “I feel misled,” Collins told The Times.

Democrat Joe Manchin, the only Democrat to vote for Kavanaugh’s nomination, also expressed disappointment. “I trusted Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch when they testified under oath that they saw Roe versus Wade as established case law and I am alarmed that they chose to challenge the stability that two generations of Americans knew through Roe,” he tells the newspaper.

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