WASHINGTON (AP) — Justice Samuel Alito mocked foreign leaders’ criticism of the Supreme Court’s ruling that struck down the constitutional right to abortion in his first public comments since last month’s decision. The judge’s remarks drew more criticism as well as some support.
Speaking in Rome at a religious freedom summit, Alito, 72, devoted just a few minutes to the topic of abortion and then only to discuss his foreign critics, an unusual step for a high court judge.
Dressed in a tuxedo and sporting a beard that he sometimes grows when the court is not in session, Alito joked that the court decision he authored had been “criticized by a whole series of foreign leaders,” then joked that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Johnson has “paid the price” for his comments. Johnson called the decision a “big step backwards” shortly before he stepped down amid unrelated ethics investigations.
The ruling by the court’s conservative majority prompted roughly a dozen states to ban or severely restrict abortions within days. Eventually, half of the US states are expected to ban or severely restrict the procedure.
Alito also drew laughter from the audience at the conference, sponsored by the University of Notre Dame Law School, when he said that “what really hurt me” were remarks made” by Britain’s Prince Harry. Speaking to the United Nations last week, Harry spoke of the “rolling back of constitutional rights here in the United States” as one of a series of converging crises that include Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also drew Alito’s attention in a speech he gave in Rome on July 21 at the invitation-only event. The law school released the video this week. Alito had not been identified in advance as a speaker at the conference.
Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Trudeau’s press secretary, Cecily Roy, said he would “always stand up for women’s constitutional rights — including the right to choose and access abortion.”
While judges routinely engage in heated exchanges with their colleagues in a duel of opinion, they rarely respond to outside critics. That’s especially true when we’re talking about foreign leaders appearing outside the U.S., said Neil Siegel, a professor of law and political science at Duke Law School.
“His tone can be quite dismissive and scathing. It’s like he just doesn’t care that there are tens of millions of people in this country and abroad who deeply disagree with him,” he said. “I think the most important thing is that our judges should not behave like that.
Still, there is no ban on justices discussing cases publicly after they are decided, said Achille Reed Amar, a professor of constitutional law at Yale Law School. Alito’s comments were not about the underlying issue of abortion, but rather about foreign dignitaries opposing American law without necessarily being well-versed in the subject, he said. Johnson, for example, may have been trying to deflect attention from his own domestic problems, Amar said.
“That was a little cheeky of them,” said Amar, who also praised Alito for responding “with some wit and style.”
The judge’s speech drew criticism Friday from U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, who tweeted that the remarks were politicized and said they “should be troubling to everyone.”
It’s “ironic” that Alito mocked international opinion even as he cited 17th- and 18th-century English jurists in the opinion rejecting Roe v. Wade, said Michelle Goodwin, a UC Irvine professor and founding director of the Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy. “He himself invested in an ideology from abroad that was quite secretive to do what he did in this decision,” he said.
The speech comes amid a sharp increase in the share of Americans who say their trust in the Supreme Court is eroding. An Associated Press Center for Public Affairs – NORC poll this week found that 43 percent of Americans have “almost no confidence” in the judiciary, up from just 27 percent three months ago.
The abortion decision was one of several seismic decisions this summer, but overturning Roe v. Wade and ending a nearly half-century guarantee of abortion rights had the most far-reaching impact.
It also prompted profound changes in other medical care, with some doctors refusing immediate treatment for serious health problems related to reproductive care for fear of running afoul of strict abortion bans.
Alito’s speech was mostly dedicated to praising religious freedom, another area where conservatives have prevailed at the Supreme Court in cases involving tax dollars for religious schools in Maine and the right of a football coach to pray at the 50-yard line.
He has been a judge since 2006, appointed by President George W. Bush.
Four years later, attending President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address, Alito was caught on camera uttering the words “not true” in response to Obama’s criticism — also unusual — of another major conservative-led judicial decision. authorities, the Citizens United case that opened the floodgates to corporate and union spending in federal election campaigns.
Alito has never discussed that dispute publicly, but it seems clear from the questions he asked when the court heard arguments that he objected to Obama saying the decision was reversing a century of law.
Alito never attended the State of the Union address again.
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Associated Press writer Rob Gillis in Toronto contributed to this report.
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