NARAL: "Gorsuch represents an existential threat to legal abortion in the United States"

Is President Trump fulfilling his promise to appoint pro-life justices?

Pro-abortion groups instantly opposed Donald Trump’s nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.

Mr Trump named Judge Gorsuch, who sits as a Colorado appeals court judge, to replace the late conservative Antonin Scalia on Tuesday. Judge Gorsuch has never ruled on abortion, but proponents, including Physicians for Reproductive Health and All Above All, immediately decried his selection.

"Direct threat to Roe v Wade"

"Gorsuch represents an existential threat to legal abortion in the United States and must never wear the robes of a Supreme Court justice," NARAL Pro-Choice America president Ilyse Hogue said in a statement. "With a clear track record of supporting an agenda that undermines abortion access and endangers women, there is no doubt that Gorsuch is a direct threat to Roe v. Wade and the promise it holds for women's equality."

Most major American pro-life groups have welcomed the news, seeing at as a fulfilment of the president's campaign trail promise to appoint pro-life justices.

Although he has not spoken out on Roe v Wade, which legalised abortion across America in 1972, he supported groups who refused to provide contraception and abortion in their health insurance.

Euthanasia opponent

Judge Gorsuch is also a vocal opponent of euthanasia. In a 2006 book, "The Future of Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia" he wrote that "all human beings are intrinsically valuable and the intentional taking of human life by private persons is always wrong."

"Once we open the door to excusing or justifying the intentional taking of life as 'necessary', we introduce the real possibility that the lives of some persons (very possibly the weakest and most vulnerable among us) may be deemed less 'valuable,' and receive less protection from the law, than others.

Hopeful history

Dr Anthony McCarthy of SPUC said, "Neil Gorsuch should be flattered to be condemned by NARAL. It is most encouraging that a judge, schooled in Natural Law arguments for the defence of life is being nominated for the Supreme Court. He has argued against well-known anti-life figures such as Peter Singer, the late Ronald Dworkin and Judge Richard Posner and his statements certainly imply a very strong opposition to abortion, consistent with his reasoned and welcome refutation of arguments deployed to justify euthanasia and assisted suicide."