Barack Obama Slammed for Not Codifying Roe v. Wade as President

On Friday, the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. The landmark ruling had granted federal protections to a woman’s right to pursue an abortion since 1973.

Former President Donald Trump is taking credit for the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade on Friday. Trump nominated three of the five Supreme Court Justices, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, joining Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas. Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, John Roberts and Elena Kagan dissented.

The decision has sent shockwaves through the country, and Democrats are not only pointing fingers at conservatives but at their own. Former Democratic President Barack Obama is getting slammed on Twitter over his failure to pass legislation that would have codified Roe v. Wade into federal law during his eight years as President. Obama took to Twitter to address SCOTUS’ decision regarding Roe v. Wade.

"Today, the Supreme Court not only reversed nearly 50 years of precedent, it relegated the most intensely personal decision someone can make to the whims of politicians and ideologues—attacking the essential freedoms of millions of Americans," the former president wrote on Twitter.

The Tweet was followed by a thread of information regarding the issue. The series of posts included a tweet that read, “Join with the activists who’ve been sounding the alarm on abortion access for years— and act.” Followed by the advice to “vote”.

Obama’s social media post set off a frenzy as people pointed out that he and his party held the supermajority in Congress between 2009 and 2011 but failed to codify Roe v. Wade into federal law. Instead, the administration left Roe v. Wade as the federal safeguard to the right to abortion.

In 2009 Obama claimed that codifying Roe into federal law was not “the highest legislative priority,” despite telling Planned Parenthood in 2007 that doing so would be one of his first actions as president.

“You had 58-60 seats in the Senate and 258 seats in the House when you were president (super majority). After promising to codify Roe, you didn’t. Too little too late to shed tears here. And you got no room to attack pro-lifers,” wrote Twitter user Nancy Mace.

Some liberals also slammed the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg for not retiring while Obama was still president, allowing him to select a liberal successor.

“The Dems refused to Codify Roe even when they had the power to,” wrote Thomas Cunningham, a screenwriter, adding, “RBG refused to retire when Obama could pick her replacement. Biden promised he'd codify Roe. Didn’t. Trump win is only 1 part. The other is Dem failure.”

"Enraging to think about the two years in the Obama administration when Democrats had a filibuster-proof majority, but didn't codify Roe into law," added author Laila Lalami.