In one of the few direct references to the Supreme Court from the Democratic National Convention’s big stage this week, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel got personal about the ongoing threat to marriage equality.
“I’ve got a message for the Republicans and the justices of the United States Supreme Court,” Nessel said, displaying her left ring finger. “You can pry this wedding band from my cold, dead, gay hand.”
Nessel was touting the refusal by Kamala Harris, as California attorney general more than a decade ago, to defend that state’s same sex-marriage ban, arguing that it was unconstitutional. That move helped send the challenge to that law all the way to the high court, ending in a 5-4 groundbreaking ruling that agreed with Harris’s assessment, granting protection for same-sex marriages nationwide.
But Nessel’s message was also an important reminder that the fight to protect the right of all people to marry who they love is not over — not even in the eyes of all of the court’s current justices.
In fact, the court’s 2022 ruling striking down Roe v. Wade didn’t just result in abortion care becoming inaccessible in wide swaths of the nation — it also came with a dangerous invitation from one of the justices.
“In future cases, we should reconsider all of this court’s substantive due process precedents,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a concurrence, specifically identifying cases that constitutionally protect the right to access contraception, to marry regardless of gender, and to privacy in one’s sexual life.
It’s not just GOP activists like the architects of Project 2025 who are promising to threaten the kind of freedom that Harris has made the centerpiece of her campaign. It’s the justices themselves who have imperiled just about every major platform priority that Democrats have highlighted at the convention in Chicago this week.
In its rulings, the court has rolled back Americans’ ability to make their own reproductive decisions, to vote freely, to have a fair shot at a good education and be able to afford it, be safe from gun violence, and to be free of others’ religious-based views and restrictions. It has gutted federal climate protections and allowed federal judges who lack expertise to substitute their judgment for the experts at federal agencies charged with protecting Americans’ safety, workplaces, the environment, and the economy. And that is just in the few years since Donald Trump’s appointment of three justices gave the court its supermajority. The Supreme Court is on the ballot in November because Trump and the justices themselves put it there.
So why aren’t Democrats saying this more plainly? They should be screaming about the Supreme Court from the rooftops.
After all, Harris rose to political prominence by protecting the rights of citizens as a prosecutor, attorney general, and a US senator who masterfully turned congressional hearings into opportunities to grill witnesses — including Supreme Court nominees — as if they were on the stand in court. A clip of Harris questioning then-nominee Brett Kavanaugh about reproductive rights was included in a video reel preceding Nessel’s address.
Harris has certainly positioned herself as the best person to prosecute the case against Trump, for both his legal transgressions and his repeated and ongoing threats to democracy.
Beating Trump is the most important goal, of course. But voters also have come to understand how crucial the court is to their lives and freedoms. And they also know the lasting impact a Supreme Court appointment has.
Imagine if Trump wins. He would not only get the opportunity to replace any number of the court’s more senior conservatives — including the chief justice — with younger, more ideologically motivated jurists. He could also replace at least one of the court’s current Democratic appointees, causing a rightward list that would take generations to recover from.
That means legal precedents protecting same-sex marriage and barring discrimination against LGBTQ Americans could fall, as could the remaining vestiges of the Voting Rights Act. Employers could not only be prevented from trying to create more diverse workspaces, they could be penalized for it. And the court could even expand presidential immunity protections with every challenged misdeed of a future Trump presidency.
The protections that Americans have relied on for their entire lives could be a single Supreme Court ruling away from evisceration.
I can think of few things that should scare, and as a result motivate, voters more. This is a case Harris and the Democrats must make.
Kimberly Atkins Stohr is a columnist for the Globe. She may be reached at kimberly.atkinsstohr@globe.com.