US Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett this week spoke about the threats made against her life following the leak of the Court’s draft Dobbs abortion decision in 2022.
The remarks came as the Supreme Court requested an additional $14.6 million in security funding as part of the fiscal year 2027 Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) appropriations bill.
Speaking at a House Appropriations FSGG Subcommittee hearing on Tuesday, Barrett recalled being sent home wearing a bulletproof vest after the draft decision overturning Roe v. Wade was leaked.
The ruling, handed down by a five-justice majority that included Barrett, overturned the 1973 decision that legalised abortion on demand across the US. The Dobbs decision allows individual states to introduce their own abortion restrictions for the first time in nearly 50 years.
Referring to the impact the threats and abuse had on her children, Justice Barrett said: “They have required me [and] my children to think about and see things that children should not have to see or think about,” Barrett said. “One example is when threats to my life were particularly intense a few years ago around the time of the Dobbs leak, my security detail sent me home with a bulletproof vest and I carried it into my house, put it into my bedroom, dropped it down on a table, turned around and my 12-year-old son was standing in the doorway of my bedroom. And he wanted to know what it was and why I had it.”
“And I didn’t know how to respond because maybe I lack imagination. But I didn’t expect that performing this service was going to put me in the position of explaining to my children what a bulletproof vest was and why I had to wear one,” Barrett said.