Anti-abortion demonstrators participate in the annual “March for Life” for the primary time because the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade’s abortion decision, in Washington, D.C., January 20, 2023.
Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters
Every Supreme Court justice was questioned – a few of them multiple times – as a part of an investigation into last 12 months’s leaked draft ruling that overturned the court’s landmark Roe v Wade abortion decision, the pinnacle of that investigation revealed Friday.
The statement got here a day after the Supreme Court declined to reveal whether the judges were among the many nearly 100 court employees and officials questioned in the inquiry. The court said the investigation did not discover the person or individuals who leaked the draft opinion, written by Judge Samuel Alito, to Politico in May.
Not one of the judges or their spouses have been identified as potential suspects, in response to Gail Curley, the marshal of the Supreme Court who oversaw the investigation into the leak.
But unlike others interviewed, not one of the judges were asked to swear an affidavit denying that that they had disclosed Alito’s opinion, Curley said in a press release.
The June ruling overturned a 50-year-old Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade that established a constitutional right to abortion.
“In the course of the investigation, I spoke to every of the judges, several on multiple occasions,” Curley said in a press release.
“The judges actively collaborated in this iterative process, asking questions and answering mine,” said Curley. “I searched for all credible leads, none of which involved the judges or their spouses. On that basis, I didn’t imagine it was essential to ask judges to sign affidavits.”
The court has nine judges. Eight of the present judges were on duty on the time of the abortion ruling. Justice Stephen Breyer retired after the ruling. CNBC asked a court spokesman if Breyer was amongst those Curley spoke to.
Curley’s report on her failure to discover the leak, released Thursday, made no mention of her questioning the judges.
The report said Curley’s team “conducted 126 formal interviews with 97 employees, all of whom denied disclosing opinions.”
Each of those staff members was asked to sign an affidavit refusing to reveal the draft opinion.