who s arguing in front of the court today? three lawyers, one representing mississippi, one representing that last abortion clinic left there, and a third representing the biden administration, which wants to keep legal abortion intact. and listen, this is the single most important legal showtown showtown in three decades. it s the case opponents of abortion have been waiting for. just a reminder, our nbc news poll from august found a slim but clear majority of u.s. adults think abortion should be legal most of the time, if the justices side with mississippi, that is in jeopardy. we have special coverage here this hour and next, and for it i want to bring in justice correspondent pete williams, ken dilanian is live not too far from where i am outside the supreme court, barbara mcquade is a former attorney and msnbc legal analyst and yasmin vossoughian is also outside the court. ken, let me start with you. these arguments are about an hour away. we re going to get to hear them
We re sitting in front of it. you can probably see those demonstrators behind me. we are in this live special coverage now today ahead of those oral arguments in a key mississippi case. the justices are going to hear those arguments from attorneys about the law in that state that bans most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. it directly challenges roe versus wade, which as you know has guaranteed women the right to a safe abortion for nearly half a century. we re going to bring you those arguments live once they start. it s also important to take a step back and talk about how we got here. in january 1973 the supreme court ruled 7-2 that the constitution protects a pregnant woman s right to an abortion without government restriction. jane roe, a pseudonym for norma mckorvey, a 22-year-old woman who was not married, dealing with drug addiction and poverty. she filed suit against henry wade challenging the texas law that prevented her from getting an abortion. the man who literally wr
Fighting last month in the supreme court about. you still can t get an abortion in texas after six weeks. and you re going to see people have to travel multiple state lines, and many people don t have the means to do that. not just the financial means, the time off from work, the care for their children, and you know, half of the people having abortions in the united states today do live below the federal poverty line. so this is really an issue of fundamental fairness, economic equality as well as gender equality. a two-part question. you mentioned, for example, the texas decision that we re still waiting on from the supreme court. any decision on this case is not likely to come until probably june. we can t say for sure, but that is what we imagined. there s months in between now and then. what are you doing? what is the center for reproductive rights doing to help women in that interim period, and how are you preparing in case what you see as the worst-case scenario happening, roe
Something that is clearly settled, or at least that many people have come to depend on. the legal standard may not be settled, but the idea that abortion should be legal seems to be largely settled. we re going to talk to one of the leaders of the abortion rights movement involved in this case. i know you ve been talking to people, too, on the other side of the issue. as you ve been out there in front of the court covering these demonstrations. tell us more about that. so we ve been talking about the viability standard, one of the arguments, hallie that s going to be made by the state of mississippi. the viability standard in roe v. wade is around 24 weeks, right? and i pressed the head of susan b. anthony, which is an antiabortion rights group that has been lobbying for that for the last 30 plus years or so about viability. and we well know the statistics here. it is rarely a fetus survives before 24 weeks. i asked her about that, especially with this mississippi case, which is ar
So he had switched over and joined with the three more liberal justices on the court. and the question is, does that vote matter now that amy coney barrett has replaced ruth bader ginsburg. and the only way it does matter is if the chief justice can pull one more moderating vote over to its side. that vote, if at all, may come from brett kavanaugh. what are the stakes of this case when it comes to legal precedent in the court? that s really the issue here. the issue is, do we continue to have a court that establishes well-established law, or do we have a results-oriented deviation from that in the area of abortion? as cecile said, the law here is clear. the supreme court should not have taken dobbs on appeal. the only reason you take a case like this is if you have a feeling that there are neal s five votes to begin to engage in change in the law. and the question here is will that change be incremental or an