Ayotte’s Supreme Court Appointee Continues His Assault on Abortion Access

Today's order in Moyle v. United States will allow doctors to continue to provide lifesaving medical care, but a dissent by three justices — including Neil Gorsuch, who Kelly Ayotte played a pivotal role in ushering onto the Court — serves as an unsettling and important reminder that extremist judges on the Supreme Court are determined to continue ripping away women’s reproductive freedoms.

Ayotte served as the “sherpa” for then-Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch in 2017, holding an essential role in his nomination process by taking part in each of his nearly 80 meetings with the senators vetting him. Ayotte also prepared Gorsuch for the Senate hearings where he “refused to take a position” on whether Roe v. Wade was settled law before ultimately becoming the first justice to sign on to the decision overturning Roe just “10 minutes after it hit his desk.”

Today, just days after the two-year anniversary of that decision, on a case relating to whether hospitals should be required to provide abortions to women who could face severe health issues as a result of their pregnancy, Gorsuch signed onto another opinion arguing that women in dire medical situations should not be able to “demand an abortion.”

“It is deeply troubling and unsurprising that former Senator Kelly Ayotte’s Supreme Court Justice has once again ruled on the side of restricting women’s access to critical reproductive healthcare,” said NHDP Spokesperson Gates MacPherson. “As Kelly Ayotte continues trying to run from her extensive anti-choice record, Granite State women are living through the dangerous new reality that Ayotte helped create, in which the extremist majority she helped install on the Supreme Court could rule at any time to strip away rights that were protected for decades. Despite Ayotte’s best efforts, Granite Staters won’t forget her past, and they will vote accordingly come November.”