Meds, Money And High Drama At The Supreme Court
The NPR Politics Podcast
NPR
4.4 • 25.7K Ratings
🗓️ 17 April 2023
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The issue arrives at the high court as it weathers yet another ethics controversy involving Justice Clarence Thomas. ProPublica reported that the justice has long failed to report lavish gifts from his friend Harlan Crow, a billionaire Republican mega-donor.
This episode: political correspondent Susan Davis, national political correspondent Mara Liasson, and legal affairs correspondent Tamara Keith.
The podcast is produced by Elena Moore and Casey Morell. It is edited by Eric McDaniel. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi. Research and fact-checking by Devin Speak.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, this is Dylan. I'm at the Mexico border starting my 2650 mile trek towards Canada along |
| 0:08.6 | Pacific Crest Trail. This pack has to be recorded at 138 pm on Monday, April 17th. Wow! |
| 0:16.0 | Things may have changed by the time you heard this, but I'll still be walking to Canada. Have a great |
| 0:20.9 | show. Good luck! Wow! That's pretty impressive. I am both impressed and horrified by that, |
| 0:28.8 | because that is not something I ever want to do, but amazing to those who can. Hey there, |
| 0:33.6 | it's the MPR Politics Podcast, I'm Susan Davis, I cover politics. I'm Mara Liesen, |
| 0:38.0 | National Political Correspondent, and I'm Nina Tottenberg, the Legal Affairs Correspondent. |
| 0:42.8 | And the legal battle over the abortion drug, Mifapristone, continues. I admit it's all been a bit |
| 0:48.0 | confusing to me with conflicting court decisions, but Nina, as you predicted, it's now before the |
| 0:53.2 | Supreme Court. This is a drug which is used for the majority of abortions in the US, and it is still |
| 0:58.3 | currently available. So, you know, you predicted rightly what happens now. Well, that is sort of the |
| 1:04.8 | question, because the court has, does have options. It's nearing the end of the term. It's next week |
| 1:11.6 | having, and the following week having its last rounds of arguments, and it's only produced |
| 1:18.0 | nine opinions so far in something like 70 cases overall for the term. So they're behind, they're |
| 1:25.1 | way behind. And this is a very complicated question, and putting myself in the position of a |
| 1:31.6 | Supreme Court Justice, which takes Hutzpah, I would want time to think about this and how to write it. |
| 1:37.2 | So, how do they do that, assuming they aren't just going to leave this in place, and I don't think |
| 1:43.2 | they'll just leave this in place? They could issue an emergency stay, blocking everything from |
| 1:50.8 | happening, and send it back to the Fifth Circuit, and say, you deal with it first, then send it to |
| 1:56.7 | us, and we'll decide what to do ultimately. Well, Nina, we know that the justices, the conservative |
| 2:02.7 | justices have said many, many times that they didn't think that abortion issues should be decided |
| 2:07.2 | by unelected judges, that the people through their legislatures should, but also in a couple cases |
... |
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