Neal Katyal Profile picture
May 3 10 tweets 2 min read
THREAD My Thoughts on @politico story saying the Court voted to say Roe v. Wade is fully overruled.

I’ve quickly scanned the draft opinion and it appears legitimate. This means there was a preliminary vote to fully overrule Roe V Wade and that a majority of the Court agreed.
There are lots of signals the opinion is legit. The length and depth of analysis, would be very hard to fake. It says it is written by Alito and definitely sounds like him. It’s 60+ pages long.
If this is a deep fake, it would require a state actor or someone like that. I can’t imagine that.
It’s possible the Court could pull back from this position, but this looks like they voted that way after the oral argument.
This opinion says states can criminalize abortion, with no rape or incest exception. It is exactly the hardline position I’ve been saying the Court is going to impose for the last 3 years. It will set women back in profound ways. Congress must act ASAP.
washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/0…
Here is the draft opinion according to politico politico.com/f/?id=00000180…
This is the equivalent of the pentagon papers leak, but at the Supreme Court. I’m pretty sure there has never ever been such a leak. And certainly not in the years I’ve been following the Supreme Court. END
Sorry one last thing for those wondering about Court procedure: After oral argument the Justices take a tentative vote. This would have happened in December. The senior most justice in the majority gets to assign the opinion. That might have been Roberts, but doubtful since...
Alito wrote this draft.
Now, once the draft is circulated, the justices in dissent will write an opinion. That's presumably happening now. But the tenative vote seems strong, and Chief Justice Roberts is irrelevant if the 4 + Alito hold with their tentative votes.
So there is the possibility an opinion can flip after oral argument and the tentative vote, so it's theoretically powerful the Alito opinion won't be the vote of the Court. But it would require a Justice BESIDES Chief Justice Roberts to flip.

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More from @neal_katyal

Mar 3
This is big. 1/6 committee just said they have a good-faith belief that Trump committed crimes.
"The Select Committee also has a good-faith basis for concluding that the President & members of his Campaign engaged in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the US in violation of § 371"
Read 5 tweets
Jan 7
Justice Kagan is flaying the small business lawyer Scott Keller right now. Oh my.
Her point is that the extraordinary nature of the pandemic justifies the vaccine mandate. He hasn't provided a coherent answer.
Now Chief Justice Roberts joins in on this line of questioning, piling on. Challengers are having a hard time. Still have not heard from Justices Barrett and Kavanaugh though.
Read 16 tweets
Jan 6
My new @TheAtlantic 1/6 piece: "This investigation into high-level wrongdoing is the greatest test an AG could face.Right now,despite what he said in yesterday’s generally good speech,it is worth worrying about whether Merrick Garland is failing that test"
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
Read 4 tweets
Dec 1, 2021
Rolling thread.

1. Breyer begins questioning by making critical point of importance of adhering to precedent in rare, watershed cases. Can imagine Breyer looking right at CJ as he asks this question.
2. Now Sotomayor follows up. She says Mississippi legislature enacted this law because the composition of US supreme Ct has changed. “How will the Ct survive the stench this creates.” “How will we (the Court) be able to survive?” This is as open a statement as I’ve seen in an arg
3. Chief Justice asks some difficult questions about whether viability framework was the issue in roe and Casey. Unclear where this is going, but Chief might be saying that viability isn’t impt to adhering to precedent like roe and Casey, that it was dicta and can be overruled
Read 39 tweets
Nov 1, 2021
Justice Thomas asks first question about the meaning of a 1908 precedent. Lawyer takes a while to get to answer but eventually does, that language doesn’t control.
The Court now gives advocates 2 minutes before questioning begins. Justice Sotomayor asks second question, helping the attorney answer Justice Thomas. Now returns to his main (strong) theme: this is an evasion of enforcement of constl rights.
Now Justice Alito jumps in, asking if Texas law is as broad as lawyer (Marc Hearron) is saying — that Texas law has a narrow “standing” provision so not everyone can actually be a vigilante. Lawyer struggling again, he should be saying it has a chilling effect.
Read 59 tweets
Oct 4, 2021
Um...so this happened. What a great honor. @SHO_Billions has been my favorite show for years, the writing and acting are incredible. Image
One thing I had no idea about was what a production something like this is. We had over 100 people with us filming in London. It was executed beautifully, true teamwork from the director, producers, assistants, everything. (These people should run our government.)
We had to quarantine for 6 days in our London hotel rooms, not allowed to leave for anything. I took it v seriously, I didn’t want to jeopardize the shoot. But I got to have balcony convos with #DavidCostabile @dolabunny and Mike Harrop, Romeo&Juliet style to try to keep me sane. Image
Read 11 tweets

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