By Laina G. Stebbins*
Posted on Michigan Advance December 3, 2021
Republished in part here under Creative Commons**
The fate of Roe v. Wade has never hung more precariously in the balance as the 6-3 conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court began hearing oral arguments Wednesday over a Mississippi abortion law that may spell the end of Roe v. Wade.
Just one day before, a 15-year-old at Oakland County’s Oxford High School allegedly opened fire, killing four students and injuring seven others.
The collision of the two issues in less than a week, both of which she is deeply involved in, is not lost on Attorney General Dana Nessel.
By the end of this Supreme Court term, it will likely be far easier for a teenage boy to acquire a firearm in Michigan than for an adult woman to procure an abortion.
-- Dana Nessel (@dananessel) December 1, 2021
In a phone interview with the Democratic AG Wednesday evening, the Michigan Advance asked how preventing gun violence and protecting abortion access is possible under a GOP-controlled state Legislature and a right-wing Supreme Court.
"Anything that’s any kind of regulation on any kind of firearm is impermissible in accordance with today’s Republican Party," Nessel said.
And most Republican officials at the state and federal level are also firmly against abortion rights.
To Nessel, both issues are prime examples of how "the Republican Party is in the extreme minority when it comes to how the public feels and how residents of the state of Michigan feel."
Sixty percent of American adults want to see Roe v. Wade upheld, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll, and Pew Research has found that roughly two-thirds of Americans have consistently opposed completely undoing Roe for the past 30 years.
Additionally, about 57 percent of Americans believe that firearm sale laws should be stricter.
Why can you buy a deadly weapon when you're 18 but not a Budweiser? I mean, it's outrageous. -- Attorney General Dana Nessel
Nessel says that the only real way to get an "extreme minority" from controlling public policy for everyone else is to vote them out of office. Michigan’s new redistricting panel will help, she contended -- a "once-in-a-decade redistricting" process and a "once-in-forever opportunity to have non-gerrymandered districts" -- with those new district changes possibly helping to get new lawmakers in charge that hold views more representative of most Michiganders.
On Wednesday, the Democrat re-upped her 2019 prediction that Roe will be successfully overturned. The Advance asked Nessel about what this would mean for Michigan, what it’s like having two college-aged children for whom active shooter drills are the norm.
It is "the worst and most helpless feeling you will ever have as a parent," Nessel said, having her kids text her while sheltered in place at school without knowing whether there could be a real threat to their lives outside their door.
Prior to becoming the state’s chief law enforcement officer, Nessel was a private attorney who notably argued a Michigan marriage equality case that ultimately became part of the landmark Obergefell v. Hodges U.S. Supreme Court decision. The Advance also talked with Nessel, the state’s first out LGBTQ top official, about the future of that case.
The following are excerpts from the interview:
Michigan Advance: We can start with the Oxford School shooting Tuesday. What has been your involvement in the investigation?
Nessel: When the shooting initially happened, we offered our assistance to the Oakland County Sheriff’s Department. But since that time, we’ve been coordinating with the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office. I’ve talked to Prosecutor [Karen] McDonald several times. My team has been consulting with her team. We’re offering just any assistance or support that we can lend, and, I think, trying to review all the evidence together and collaborate as much as possible. I have a really close relationship with Prosecutor McDonald. This is a pretty big case for her first year in office, but I think she’s handling it very well.
Michigan Advance: The charges against the shooting suspect, particularly the terrorism charge — do you think those are fair?
Nessel: Yeah. Absolutely. I fully support Prosecutor McDonald in her charging decision.
Michigan Advance: What can be done on gun reform in Michigan since our state’s GOP-led Legislature won’t act?
Nessel: Well, how much time do you have? You use that last caveat, right -- "since they won’t act." There are so many common sense gun laws that could be put in place right now, that could’ve prevented what happened [Tuesday] altogether. Some of these are laws that they have in other states. These are not laws that infringe upon a person’s Second Amendment right to bear arms. They’re just common sense reforms that would protect our society, and many which would specifically protect our children.
But I think what we’re going to have to do at this point -- understanding, of course, that we’re going to have our once-in-a-decade redistricting and our once-in-forever opportunity to have non-gerrymandered districts -- I think that we are likely to have more moderated districts where you’ll have a competitive district that had been gerrymandered for so long, instead of it being a rush to the base and to support the concept of "anyone should have any kind of gun, any time, any place, under any circumstances," which is really what the Republican Party subscribes to now.
… Even 10 years ago, it would be hard for me to picture even Republicans supporting the ghost guns, and now you do. That is what you have at this point because anything that’s any kind of regulation on any kind of firearm is impermissible in accordance with today’s Republican Party.
I think we have to view what happened [Tuesday] as an opportunity to make progress so that the lives of these poor kids, whose lives are cut short, or those who are badly injured, or even for the kids, the survivors who were there and present and will forever be impacted by what happened that day, even if they themselves were not injured, we have to do something to advance these bills. If that means having to elect new people for the Legislature with a new mindset, who understand the great importance of reasonable gun laws, then so be it. Then that is what we have to do.
Whether it has to do with gun laws that a vast majority of Michigan residents support, or whether it has to do with the other big news of the day which is the SCOTUS arguments. The vast majority of Michiganders think that Roe ought to be upheld and believe that a woman has a right to have a medically safe abortion [and] that’s between her and her doctor. Any of these issues where the Republican Party is in the extreme minority when it comes to how the public feels and how residents of the state of Michigan feel.
But this will be, I guess, our opportunity at the polls to say, 'We want to have a legislature that is more in keeping with the way that Michigan residents think and what our values and our belief system is.' … Honestly, someone has to hold these folks that are running for my seat accountable, because no one’s asking these difficult questions. … People need to know how they feel about [them], so they can see the differences between the parties. ... CLICK HERE to read the rest of this article on Michigan Advance.
Editor's Notes:
* Laina G. Stebbins, author of this article, is a reporter for Michigan Advance. She covers the environment, Native American issues and criminal justice for the Advance. A lifelong Michigander, she is a graduate of Michigan State University’s School of Journalism. Read more about Laina here.
** Michigan Advance gives permission for republishing their articles under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
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