Friend,

The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade today. It’s a sad and infuriating day. A group of Republican politicians in robes tore up constitutional abortion protections that had been in place for nearly 50 years. Women in this country will have fewer freedoms than their mothers did.

Justices who made this decision simply lied to the American people about their intent regarding Roe v. Wade in order to secure lifetime appointments to the court. They told the public in their confirmation hearings that the precedent was settled law. But once Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell smashed up the confirmation process to get the votes onto the Court to overturn Roe, the justices wasted no time.

With Roe overturned, more than two dozen states are set to enact laws that either ban abortion outright or restrict it so much as to effectively ban it. The fallout from this decision will be immediate, and it will disproportionately fall on women of color and poor women.

Let’s not forget how we got here: The extremist right wing carried out a decades-long scheme to pack the Supreme Court with crusader justices and hid behind dark money to do their political dirty work.

The right wing has turned the Supreme Court into the judicial arm of the Republican Party. Overturning Roe wasn’t the first politically motivated decision of this ultraconservative court that is completely untethered to precedent, and it won't be the last.

The stakes are too high now to let Republicans win back control of Congress in November. Roe is on the ballot. If Republicans are in charge, they could very well pass a nationwide abortion ban and they’d have complete control over the next Supreme Court nomination process.

A lot of Americans are rightfully scared and upset today. This is a major setback with serious, life-altering consequences for women. But we’re in this fight together. I will not let the right-wing megadonors have the last word on women’s rights. There is reason for hope. There are things we can do to counter the court and fix the mess special interests have made of it. We can codify Roe into law by electing more Democrats to Congress. We can win this fight in state houses across the country. Let’s get organized.

Sincerely,

Sheldon