NARAL Pro-Choice Colorado spoke out last week against Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, and Colorado native, Judge Neil Gorsuch.
That organization’s stance on Gorsuch is embodied in the simple phrase, “No Roe. No go.” The seat left vacant by the death of Antonin Scalia has had one prior nominee, during the Obama Administration, whom Republicans in Congress refused to vote on.
President Trump has made it clear that he will only nominate pro-life judges to the U.S. Supreme Court during his time in office.
Gorsuch’s past rulings make it unclear whether the judge supports Roe v. Wade, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that protects a person’s right to abortion.
His ruling on Hobby Lobby indicates he may support the idea of personhood, which would confer legal rights to fertilized eggs and thus ban abortion.
NARAL insists these values are not in line with Colorado. The organization’s Executive Director Karen Middleton released a comment on Gorsuch in a news release.
“The National Institute for Reproductive Health has said Judge Gorsuch’s nomination is “an extension of the Trump administration’s attacks on women’s rights.” We agree.
President Trump has said he will only appoint ‘pro-life’ Justices to the Supreme Court who will overturn Roe v. Wade. And until Judge Gorsuch states otherwise – that he supports the Constitutional right to abortion enshrined in Roe – we will take President Trump at his word.
What we have seen from Judge Gorsuch is troubling. Judge Gorsuch has a record of ruling in a way that does not reflect Colorado values on reproductive rights, because he has consistently ruled against contraceptive access.
Colorado is a pro-choice state that strongly supports the Constitutional right to abortion in Roe and the constitutional right to privacy established in Griswold – beliefs that are contradicted in Judge Gorsuch’s ruling in Hobby Lobby and Little Sisters. Judge Gorsuch’s ruling in Hobby Lobby even indicates support for “personhood,” the conferring of legal rights to a fertilized egg that Coloradans have rejected at the ballot box multiple times. He said that, “the mandate compels Hobby Lobby and Mardel to underwrite payments for drugs or devices that can have the effect of destroying a fertilized human egg.” This is not scientifically accurate and counter to the will of Colorado voters.
Based on his rulings, Colorado women can’t trust Judge Gorsuch to uphold a woman’s Constitutional right to abortion. He has already indicated he will not support our access to contraception.
Our position on Judge Gorsuch is simple: No Roe, No Go. And we oppose his nomination for that reason.”
