The American conservative right warmly welcomed on Friday the Supreme Court ruling which “casts into oblivion from history” the right to abortion, while the left and several organizations have on the contrary promised to continue to “fight” to defend it.
In a televised address, President Joe Biden lamented a “sad day” for the United States, calling the decision a “tragic mistake”, the result of “extremist ideology”.
According to the Democrat, “the health and lives of women are now in danger”.
Former President Donald Trump told Fox News that the decision was “God’s will”.
Its former vice-president Mike Pence also hailed on Twitter the repair of a “historic error”. This devout evangelical Christian welcomed the fact that the famous decision which guaranteed the right to abortion for almost 50 years had been “thrown into the dustbin of history”.
The Pro-Life Campaign also called it “a momentous day for human rights”.
flip-flop
In a historic about-face, the very conservative Supreme Court of the United States on Friday buried a judgment which, for nearly half a century, guaranteed the right of American women to have an abortion.
This decision does not make voluntary terminations of pregnancy illegal, but returns the United States to the situation in force before the emblematic decision “Roe v. Wade” from 1973, when each state was free to authorize them or not.
And several States have already announced that they are taking measures to prohibit voluntary terminations of pregnancy on their territory.
“This is a monumental day for the sanctity of life,” Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt said in a tweet accompanied by an image showing him ratifying a text that “truly” ends abortion in this conservative middle state.
Republican Governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem, announced that abortion was now illegal in this northern state of the United States, under a so-called “zombie” or “trigger” law which had been drafted in advance, to come into force automatically in the event of a change in jurisprudence at the Supreme Court.
“At will”
The pro-choice and anti-choice camps immediately mobilized, like the often irreconcilable fractures that cross the United States.
“Today the Supreme Court not only overturned nearly 50 years of historic precedent, it also left the most personal decision to the will of politicians and ideologues,” former Democratic President Barack Obama said on Twitter. .
The main American family planning organization has promised to continue to “fight” to restore this right, and to preserve it as much as possible at the local level.
The three progressive states on the West Coast of the United States have also announced that they are jointly committed to defending the right to abortion. “The governors of California, Oregon and Washington today released a commitment to defend access to reproductive health care, including abortion and contraceptives,” they said in a statement.
“Go Back”
Canada and the United Kingdom, two of the United States’ closest allies, have deplored the Supreme Court’s decision.
“The news from the United States is horrible. My heart goes out to the millions of American women who will lose their legal right to abortion,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson lamented a “great step back”.
Believing that “abortion is a fundamental right for all women”, French President Emmanuel Macron expressed his “solidarity with the women whose freedoms are today challenged by the Supreme Court of the United States of America. “.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, criticized “a blow to women’s human rights and gender equality”, recalling that “more than 50 countries with restrictive laws have relaxed their abortion laws over the past 25 years. »
During his speech, Joe Biden notably lamented that the United States was an “exception” in the world.