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Maybe not a surprise, but no less shocking. What's next after Justice Samuel Alito's February draft opinion on Roe?

It's your Politico Playbook Daily Briefing.

We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected

by any constitutional provision.

Thus begins Justice Samuel Alito's February draft opinion that would end the constitutional

right to abortion in America, obtained exclusively by Politico's Josh Gerstein and Alexander Ward.

Here's the thing, we knew this was coming.

Ever since last December's oral arguments in the Mississippi abortion case,

it seemed likely there was a majority on the court to overrule Rowan Casey.

But while not a surprise, it was still shocking to see Alito's words in black and white.

The culmination of a half a century of legal conservatives organizing around the idea that Roe was wrongly decided and needed to be reversed.

In his opinion, Alito anticipated a fierce political backlash coming and offered a preemptive response, quote,

we cannot allow our decisions to be affected by any extraneous influences,

such as concern about the public's reaction to our work.

Senator Bernie Sanders was one of the first out of the gate with the demand that Democrats

in Congress used their majority to codify Roe into law.

He wrote, quote, and if there aren't 60 votes in the Senate to do it, and there are not,

we must end the filibuster to pass it with 50 votes. The only problem with that, there may not be 50 votes for it in the Senate by way of Politico's Burgess Everett. There really is no scenario where the 50-50 Senate gets rid of the filibuster for abortion legislation this year. Mentioned his anti-abortion rights, and Collins and Murkowski would invoke to change the Senate rules under a Democratic majority.

Speaking of Senator Collins, the Supreme Court seems poised to do what Collins assured her abortion rights supporting main constituents that it would never do when she voted to confirm Kavanaugh.

Here's a quote from a conversation she had back in 2018 with the reporter. The question, why do you think Kavanaugh would not repeal or overturned Roe v. Wade? Collins's answer, quote,

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