Roe v. Wade – Page 3 – Deep Left Field

Even though he’s an arrogant asshat of a human being, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) wants us all to know that he’s “not a moron.”

Speaking with reporters on Capitol Hill, Cruz insisted that the draft Supreme Court opinion reversing the Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania vs. Casey decisions was leaked by a liberal law clerk working for one of the three progressive justices, though he’s also said he suspects someone in the office of Justice Sonia Sotomayor without providing a shred of evidence to support such a serious accusation.

“They wanted to put heat and they wanted to invoke politics to try to get them to change their vote. And by the way, if that left-wing law clerk succeeds, it would be the most grotesque politicization of the Supreme Court in the history of our nation.”

During a appearance on Fox Business, Cruz laid out his unsubstantiated conspiracy theory, telling host Stuart Varney:

But, when he was confronted by reporters and asked to provide substantiation for his claims, Cruz turned into a snotty little douchebag.

A reporter asked the senator:

“Senator, why do you think you know this was a liberal clerk who leaked this? Do you have information that suggests that?”

Cruz huffily replied:

“Because I’m not a moron. Because I live on planet earth. Because this is obviously an attempt from someone who is unhappy about the direction the Court is going, to put political pressure on the Justices to change their outcome. That is the only reason this gets leaked, and you know that. Come on, you’re a reporter in Washington DC.”

That led the reporter to inquire about the possibility that a conservative might have leaked the opinion because “they supported the original [Roe] decision and want to lock them [the Justices] back in. That’s a completely reasonable scenario, isn’t it?”

Cruz:

“You know what, I, I, I, find that ludicrous. But if it’s the case, maybe you’ll win a Pulitzer for that.”

The reporter countered:

“Well you’re saying you have no evidence.”

That led Cruz to retort:

“I think it’s obvious what’s going on here. And, and, and, we’ve all seen leaks often enough in this town, just not at the Supreme Court. This has never happened in any case ever, and it is truly horrifying.”

Actually, it has indeed happened in another case. Ironically, the 1973 Roe v. Wade opinion which gave women the right to make their own reproductive choices was also leaked.

If indeed it can be proven that a conservative leaked the draft, someone needs to play today’s video for Cruz and get his reaction. He might just cry.

Oh, and Ted Cruz is indeed a moron. His own words indict him on that count.

Ever since a draft Supreme Court opinion in the case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization was leaked to Politico, outrage from figures on the political right has been palpable, with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) all but foaming at the mouth as he insisted that if the leaker can be found, he or she needs to be punished to the maximum extent of the law.

But what if the actual leaker was a conservative, perhaps even a conservative Supreme Court justice?

Jonathan Chait of New York magazine was a guest on MSNBC to discuss a column he wrote in which he laid out the case that someone on the right is the most likely suspect:

“I want to be clear that I have no idea who leaked this and it definitely could have come from the left. but I wrote this because so much of the commentary from the right simply assumed that the leaks that come from the left and ignored the fact that we have a smaller leak three days before from the Wall Street Journal that had the same effect they’re decrying, which is to put public pressure on the justices to rule in a certain way. That is the reason why they say this leak is so dangerous, because it subjects the justices to this kind of lobbying and that is exactly why the Wall Street Journal was leaked this early version, and they really had the inside scoop on the breakdown inside of the court.”

The editorial Chait referenced from the Wall Street Journal included this paragraph:

“If [Roberts] pulls another Justice to his side, he could write the plurality opinion that controls in a 6-3 decision. If he can’t, then Justice Thomas would assign the opinion and the vote could be 5-4. Our guess is that Justice Alito would then get the assignment.”

And that’s exactly what happened, as Chait noted in his article:

This turned out to be a good guess!
The editorial proceeded to craft an argument for why Kavanaugh and Barrett should stick with Alito rather than defecting to Roberts. Leaking internal deliberations in order to lobby the justices seems to be fine when conservatives are doing it.

Chait ends his article with this analogy:

If a bank employee stole a small amount of money from the safe and then, a few days later, there was a huge robbery from the same safe, who would be your first suspect?

As supporting evidence, Chait included these tweets from conservative Randy Barnett:

https://twitter.com/RandyEBarnett/status/1522160270017282051?s=20&t=Uy6MBIv2YEA8dgHtbTrlHg

Two hours later, Barnett tweeted:

https://twitter.com/RandyEBarnett/status/1522190059604164619?s=20&t=204-0wtIIxEQVe32ucSETA

It’ll be interesting to see what Ted Cruz and other conservatives have to say if Chait’s theory of a right-wing leak is proven to be true.