Carbondale Reporter

Illinois Rep. Paul Jacobs issued a statement following the recent leak of a draft U.S. Supreme Court ruling that could overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark case legalizing abortion.

If Roe v. Wade were overturned, abortion rights would no longer be protected by the Constitution, which would allow states to ban the practice outright, Politico reported.

"I am a pro-life Republican and the only physician of any kind serving in the Illinois General Assembly," Jacobs, an optometrist, said in the statement. "I value life and worked for forty years to improve the quality of life for my patients, both young and old. I am a father and a grandfather. Life is beautiful and it must be protected. Unfortunately, left-leaning politicians currently running our government have enacted laws that make Illinois an abortion destination state where someone can have an abortion paid for by the taxpayer for any reason at any time of pregnancy up to and including birth."

Politico broke the news of the draft opinion on May 3.

"The draft opinion is a full-throated, unflinching repudiation of the 1973 decision which guaranteed federal constitutional protections of abortion rights and a subsequent 1992 decision — Planned Parenthood v. Casey — that largely maintained the right," Politico reported.

The draft featured the label "Opinion of the Court," Politico reported.

"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start," Justice Samuel Alito said in the draft opinion. "We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people's elected representatives."

Chief Justice John Roberts said the leak of the draft opinion written by Alito was "absolutely appalling," CNN reported.

"I strongly oppose these policies and have voted to protect the unborn," Jacobs said. "The Supreme Court's possible decision on behalf of the unborn will return the responsibility for legislating on the issue of abortion back to the States. This possible decision will not have an immediate impact on abortion rights in Illinois, no matter what JB Pritzker or his Democratic cohorts might be trying to sell you. We will unfortunately remain an abortion-friendly state as long as left-leaning politicians run the Illinois government."

The justices were to have another closed-door conference in Washington, D.C., on May 12, CNN reported.

"I am deeply disturbed at the idea that someone from within the Supreme Court, aware of internal deliberations and writings of the Justices, would leak this draft decision to the media for purely political reasons," Jacobs said. "I also find it unsurprising that Governor Pritzker is so outraged at the suggestion that the Court would remand these kinds of decisions back to legislators, the direct representatives of the people, as he has shown time and again throughout his management of the COVID-19 pandemic that he prefers one-man control and top-down edicts from the Executive branch."