LITTLE ROCK— On Friday, Mayor Frank Scott, Jr. released the following statement about the Supreme Court of the United States’ decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and strip women of the right to privacy, bodily autonomy and reproductive rights:
“In the strongest way possible, I condemn today’s SCOTUS opinion that strips women’s constitutional rights to make decisions about their bodies. This was settled law in our country for half a century, and today’s ruling mistakenly leaves the question of access to abortion up to individual states, of which 13, including Arkansas, have trigger laws to ban abortion if Roe v. Wade was overturned. There are issues that should not be left to individual states to decide. A woman’s right to privacy about her reproductive health should be the law of the land in every state in this country.
“Little Rock had two of the state’s three remaining clinics that provided abortion services – this means that hundreds of thousands of women throughout the region could rely on the clinics in our city as a means of providing safe, healthy, reproductive care.
“I want to be clear: I am committed to ensuring that we move in the right direction, and make Little Rock the best place it can be while ensuring it’s the safest place to be for all women who want to, or need, the care they must have to stay well, and be well.”
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