MSNBC host Joy Reid condemned U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Friday for his opposition to the court’s ruling to allow the FDA to keep the abortion drug mifepristone available to American women.
On an episode of her show The ReidOut, the news host and commenter likened Alito to a “mullah” in his dissent. In some cultures, “mullah” is a slang term used to describe an Islamic religious zealot.
On Friday, Fox News reported that “after delaying its decision earlier this week, the Supreme Court on Friday ruled that full access to the abortion pill mifepristone can continue as a lawsuit works its way through the lower federal courts.”
The report continued: “The decision was perceived as a victory of the Biden administration and the pro-choice side who have been fighting to make the pill more available, especially since the end of Roe v. Wade with the Court’s decision in Dobbs last year.”
Both Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented from the ruling, but Fox News accused Reid of choosing to slam only Alito’s dissent during her show.
“Let me just skip to this part: ‘Here the government has not dispelled legitimate doubts that it would even obey an unfavorable order in these cases, much less that it would choose to take enforcement actions to which it has strong objections,” Reid read from an excerpt from Alito’s opinion.
During the segment on the broadcast, she invited MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin and another panelist to join her in the discussion.
“Lisa, this reads to me like him admitting, ‘We don’t have an army, we don’t have the ability to enforce our decisions, and we’re not sure the government would even obey,” adding “that’s a pretty glaring admission of weakness and a pretty churlish thing to write down in your dissent. This guy seems to be all in his feelings that the American people oppose his attempts to play mullah instead of Supreme Court justice and ban abortion.”
Rubin acknowledged Reid’s views, stating “there’s no indication on this record, as you noted, that the FDA wouldn’t follow a validly issued court order, and for him to insinuate that this administration and this independent FDA wouldn’t follow the law is, to use your words, absurdly churlish and not becoming of a justice of the Supreme Court.”
