Conservative US supreme court justices signal support for restricting abortion in pivotal case

Conservative justices in the US supreme court have signaled their support for curbing abortion access during oral arguments in the most important reproductive rights case in decades, threatening the future of abortion access across the country.

Campaigners have warned the case poses a direct threat to the legal underpinnings of Roe v Wade, a landmark 1973 decision that guaranteed the constitutional right to abortion. In their lines of questioning on Wednesday, liberal justices warned against abandoning important legal precedent, while conservatives argued for reviewing it.

Dobbs is the first abortion rights case to be heard by the new, conservative-dominated bench. Trump successfully confirmed three justices to the court, and thus created a new conservative supermajority with six of nine justices leaning to the right. While far from a foregone conclusion, questions from conservative justices appeared to show there was not a majority to uphold Roe v Wade in its current form.

Conservative justices including Kavanaugh indicated an interest in overturning Roe, and allowing states to determine their own laws. In that scenario, more than half of US states are expected to ban or severely restrict abortion access.

Sotomayor said Mississippi brought its new challenge purely because of changes on the supreme court bench.

A ban on nearly all abortions at or after 15 weeks would represent a huge blow for abortion access across the county. To allow such a restriction, the court would need to issue a ruling that would overturn or substantially weaken Roe v Wade, which in many states is the only legal protection guaranteeing the right to abortion access.

If Roe v Wade were overturned, 26 states are expected to move to make abortion illegal. About 40 million women of reproductive age, or about 58% of the people who can get pregnant in the US, live in states considered hostile to abortion rights. Law enforcement experts believe criminalizing abortion, again, would lead to a public health crisis and a wave of prosecutions.