Justice Samuel Alito is the latest Supreme Court Justice to see protests outside his home following last week’s leaked Supreme Court opinion draft which indicated the court’s intention to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling.
Around 100 protestors marched in front of his house in Alexandria, Virginia on Monday night. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaughhave also seen protests outside of their homes since the confidentiality breach.
Alito, one of the court’s most consistently conservative justices, was the author of the opinion draft. He was joined by Justices Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas, Amy Coney Barrett and Neil Gorsuch in voting to return the right to decide on abortion laws to individual states. Roberts had likely joined the court’s three liberal justices in upholding Roe, which federally legalized abortion across the country, or written a separate opinion.
In light of the recent protests, the Senate unanimously approved a bill that will provide more security for the justices’ houses on Monday night.
“We’ve seen angry crowds assemble at judges’ private family homes. Activists published a map of their addresses. Law enforcement has had to install a security fence around the Supreme Court itself,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said during a speech on the Senate floor. “Trying to scare federal judges into ruling a certain way is far outside the bounds of First Amendment speech or protest.”
The bill will go to the House to be voted on next.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki called on outraged conservatives to be as upset when protestors visit liberal political figures’ houses.
“So, I know that there’s an outrage right now, I guess, about protests that have been peaceful today – and we certainly continue to encourage that outside of judges’ homes and that’s the president’s position – but the silence is pretty deafening about all of the other intimidation that we’ve seen to a number of people,” she said.
The case has not officially been decided and a final opinion is expected in late June.
