As Justice Amy Coney Barrett releases her new memoir, CNN Supreme Court analyst Joan Biskupic couldn’t help but trash the part of the book where Barrett defends overturning Roe v. Wade. On Tuesday’s The Situation Room, Biskupic claimed that Barrett’s argument that Roe undermined the democratic process was bad because the Constitution is to be interpreted to protect minority rights, a claim that is not only not accurate but also one that Biskupic only seems to be applying to abortion.
Biskupic began with the suggestion that the country will survive or fall in the Trump era based on Barrett’s rulings, “She’s arguably the most important justice on a Court at such a crucial time in America, testing how much it will check President Trump's effort to really remake the country.”
Getting to Roe, Biskupic notes, “You know that one of the foundational principles of the Supreme Court is loyalty to precedent. And this was a 1973 ruling that they were tossing out. And she said that that decision should not even have existed in the first place, because it did not rise to the level of a true constitutional right.”
Reading from the book, Biskupic continued, “She said that constitutional rights should be implicit. Constitutional rights should be embedded in American history. And here's what she said, ‘The evidence does not show that the American people have traditionally considered the right to obtain an abortion, so fundamental to liberty that it ‘goes without saying’ in the Constitution. In fact, the evidence cuts in the opposite direction. Abortion not only lacked long-standing protection in American law, it had long been forbidden.’”
She then retorted, “In fact, what she was saying is it sort of flouted the democratic process. But as you know, the Constitution is there to be interpreted to protect minority rights, not to necessarily adhere to the will of the American majority.”
No, the Constitution is to be interpreted based on what it says. Sometimes the democratic majority gets its way, and sometimes the minority is protected from that majority. It all depends on what the Constitution says about the specific issue. Additionally, when the Court hears cases involving Democrat-run bureaucracies, Biskupic tends to believe they should be able to do whatever they want.
Here is a transcript for the September 2 show:
CNN The Situation Room
9/2/2025
10:44 AM ET
JOAN BISKUPIC: She’s arguably the most important justice on a Court at such a crucial time in America, testing how much it will check President Trump's effort to really remake the country.
Roe v. Wade, you know, ensured a national right to abortion. And it was in place for nearly 50 years. When the justices rolled it back in 2022, Justice Amy Coney Barrett signed on to Sam Alito's opinion but did not write anything separately. So, this is the first time that she's actually saying why she did that and what she talks about is why the Court was permitted in this case to turn its back on precedent.
You know that one of the foundational principles of the Supreme Court is loyalty to precedent. And this was a 1973 ruling that they were tossing out. And she said that that decision should not even have existed in the first place, because it did not rise to the level of a true constitutional right.
She said that constitutional rights should be implicit. Constitutional rights should be embedded in American history. And here's what she said, “The evidence does not show that the American people have traditionally considered the right to obtain an abortion, so fundamental to liberty that it ‘goes without saying’ in the Constitution. In fact, the evidence cuts in the opposite direction. Abortion not only lacked long-standing protection in American law, it had long been forbidden.”
In fact, what she was saying is it sort of flouted the democratic process. But as you know, the Constitution is there to be interpreted to protect minority rights, not to necessarily adhere to the will of the American majority.
