The courts continue to be the one political actor that holds the most control over November’s outcome.
Everyone is now scrambling.
And it’s due to the fact that the Supreme Court just threw the 2024 election into chaos with this major ruling.
Arizona Supreme Court upholds state’s Pro-Life law
The conservative majority on the Arizona Supreme Court handed down a blockbuster decision holding that the state’s 1864 law that protects life in all cases except if the mother’s life is in danger is enforceable over a 15-week Pro-Life law former Governor Doug Ducey signed in 2022.
“We consider whether the Arizona Legislature repealed or otherwise restricted [the old law] by enacting . . . the statute proscribing physicians from performing elective abortions after fifteen weeks’ gestation,” Justice John Lopez. “This case involves statutory interpretation—it does not rest on the justices’ morals or public policy views regarding abortion; nor does it rest on [the old law’s] constitutionality, which is not before us.”
Lopez wrote that since the Dobbs decision found that there was no federal right to an abortion and the 15-week Pro-Life law didn’t “authorize” abortion there was nothing stopping the 1864 Pro-Life law from taking effect.
“Absent the federal constitutional abortion right, and because [the fifteen-week limit] does not independently authorize abortion, there is no provision in federal or state law prohibiting [the 1864 law’s] operation. Accordingly, [the 1864 law] is now enforceable,” the opinion continued.
The justices said it wasn’t their place to weigh in on the public policy matter of protecting life or not, but rather to interpret the State Constitution while leaving the matter of abortion up to the people.
“The abortion issue implicates morality and public policy concerns, and invariably inspires spirited debate and engenders passionate disagreements among citizens,” the opinion added. “A policy matter of this gravity must ultimately be resolved by our citizens through the legislature or the initiative process. Today, we decline to make this weighty policy decision because such judgments are reserved for our citizens. Instead, we merely follow our limited constitutional role and duty to interpret the law as written.”
Democrats celebrate
Former Obama chief strategist David Axelrod claimed on CNN that this decision would push Arizona and other battleground states into the Democrat column.
Axelrod claimed an Arizona ballot initiative codifying abortion-on-demand up until birth will supercharge Democrat turnout in the state.
“So I think what this does is it puts a battleground state more in the leaning D column and then the leaning R column because I think there’s going to be a massive turnout in November for a constitutional amendment in the state of Arizona because the voters of Arizona now have a demonstration of the fragility of abortion rights in the post Dobbs era. I think this is an earthquake, those electoral votes in Arizona could be the ones that tip this election” Axelrod stated.
Polls show Donald Trump leading Joe Biden in Arizona.
Immigration and inflation were the big issues.
Democrats and the media seized on this ruling as an attempt to turn the conversation away from Joe Biden’s failures and towards a smear campaign falsely claiming Republicans want to take women’s rights away.
