Senate Republicans’ Attacks On Interracial Marriage, Contraceptives, Roe & Same-Sex Marriage Underscore Stakes Of Protecting & Expanding Democratic Majority

As news coverage highlights how “Republicans struggle for an effective attack on Ketanji Brown Jackson,” Senate Republicans are now attacking interracial marriage, contraceptives, Roe v. Wade, and same-sex marriage – sketching a “terrifying vision for America” that reinforces the stakes of protecting and expanding our Democratic Senate majority.  

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesperson Nora Keefe: “Republicans have shown they will use every tired and offensive excuse to try and block Judge Jackson’s historic and qualified nomination to serve on the Supreme Court. Their relentless attacks on Judge Jackson and Americans’ most basic freedoms reinforces the stakes of this year’s election and why we must defend and expand our Democratic Senate majority with the power to confirm Supreme Court justices.” 

See for yourself:

HuffPost: Beyond Roe: With SCOTUS Hearings, GOP Sketches Terrifying Vision For America

• Republicans have made clear they’re rooting for the court to strike down Roe v. Wade. But what’s been new in the past week has been GOP senators starting to talk about other landmark cases they’d like to see overturned ― outcomes that would radically restrict Americans’ rights.
  
• To summarize: This week alone, Republicans have advocated for a country where interracial marriage, same-sex marriage, contraception access and abortion could very well be denied, depending on the state someone lives in. In other words, the federal government would not recognize a marriage between a Black woman and a white man, and they would be denied all accompanying benefits.

Washington Post: Republican Sen. Mike Braun says Supreme Court should leave decisions on interracial marriage, abortion to the states

• Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) said Tuesday that he would be open to the Supreme Court overturning its 1967 ruling that legalized interracial marriage nationwide to allow states to independently decide the issue.
  
• Braun — who made the comments during a conference call in which he discussed the nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court — also said he’d welcome the rescinding of several key decisions made by the court in the past 70 years to pass the power to the states.
  
• Braun cited a series of landmark decisions made by the court, including Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion, and Loving v. Virginia, which legalized interracial marriage.
  
• As the Senate weighs Jackson’s nomination, some of Braun’s fellow Senate Republicans have questioned landmark Supreme Court decisions.

• On Monday, Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), during her questioning of Jackson, said she opposes Griswold, calling the decision “constitutionally unsound.”

• Similarly, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) questioned Jackson on Tuesday on the court’s authority in Obergefell v. Hodges, the 2015 decision that legalized marriage equality — which he called an “edict.”
  

HuffPost: GOP Sen. Mike Braun Says Interracial Marriage Should Be Left To The States

• Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) said Tuesday that he believes interracial marriage should not be legal nationwide and that individual states should decide whether to allow it.

• “So you would be OK with the Supreme Court leaving the question of interracial marriage to the states?” reporter Dan Carden of The Times of Northwest Indiana asked Braun.

• “Yes,” the senator replied on the call with Indiana reporters. 

Newsweek: Mike Braun’s Interracial Marriage Remarks Condemned As ‘Un-American’

• Critics have slammed Senator Mike Braun (R-IN) after he suggested the issue of interracial marriage should be left up to states despite a longstanding Supreme Court ruling on the matter.

MSNBC: Blackburn denounces Supreme Court contraception ruling from 1965

• For much of the last six decades, even Republicans were cautious about criticizing Griswold for an obvious reason: The American mainstream broadly supports public access to birth control.
  
• It’s against this backdrop that Blackburn, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, denounced Griswold as “constitutionally unsound.”
  
• Perhaps now would be a good time to ask other Republican senators if they agree?

The Tennessean: Sen. Marsha Blackburn criticizes 1965 Supreme Court ruling on birth control access

• U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn this weekend called a landmark 1965 Supreme Court ruling legalizing access to contraception “constitutionally unsound” in comments criticizing the nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the high court. 

Mother Jones: Republican Senator Lashes Out at Marriage Equality in Supreme Court Hearing

• During the second day of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing Tuesday, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) took the occasion to attack marriage equality.
  
• While a majority of Americans support marriage equality, it remains a target for repeal by many on the right.
  
• His questions are a sign of how conservatives view equal rights for LGBTQ people and how they plan to undo them.

Houston Chronicle: Cornyn rips 2015 same-sex marriage ruling in SCOTUS hearing: ‘Who do these people think they are?’

• U.S. Sen. John Cornyn on Tuesday pointed to the landmark 2015 Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage as an example of the sort of “court-made law” that he worries Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson might practice if she were confirmed to the high court.

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