The Supreme Court of the United States this week slashed Joe Biden's student debt forgiveness plan, did away with affirmative action, and upheld the First Amendment's protection of religious expression. In dissenting from the majority in both cases, the Court's liberal justices relied on plainly inaccurate claims.
Ketanji Brown Jackson
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson joined the dissent in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, in which the Court ruled that race-conscious admissions policies violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. She cited an Association of American Medical Colleges study that argues for the "critical importance of diversity in the medical profession." Affirmative action, Jackson claimed, doubles the chance of black infant survival: "For high-risk Black newborns, having a Black physician more than doubles the likelihood that the baby will live, and not die."
The study, however, finds that black infants have a 99.6 percent survival rate with black doctors and a 99.8 percent survival rate with white doctors. What Jackson misinterpreted when she claimed that the black infant survival rate "doubles" with a black doctor is the discrepancy that more white doctors are in Neonatal intensive care units (NICU), where babies are less likely to survive. If a black baby has a black doctor, it's likely because that baby is not in a NICU, which of course yields higher survival rates.
Sonia Sotomayor
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a long dissent for 303 Creative v. Elenis, in which the court determined that a Christian web designer cannot be compelled to make a wedding website for a gay couple. In her dissent, Sotomayor said a "social system of discrimination created an environment in which LGBT people were unsafe," and quoted many examples including the murder of Matthew Shepard, who was, "targeted by two men, tortured, tied to a buck fence, and left to die for who he was," Sotomayor wrote. Shepard, who was involved in the Wyoming meth drug culture, was murdered by a bisexual who confirmed that the murder had nothing to do with Shepard's being gay.
Sotomayor’s interpretation of Shepard’s death is in line with the mainstream narrative that’s coalesced around the incident. That popular telling has inspired countless articles, a gay-rights non-profit, and, ultimately, the Matthew Shepard Act, a law signed by President Obama in 2009 that expanded the scope of offenses that could be considered hate crimes under federal law. Sotomayor’s version of events was ultimately debunked by author Stephen Jiminez, who spent thirteen years reporting and writing a book about Shepard’s death. The book, Hidden Truths about the Murder of Matthew Shepard, advances the argument that a dispute over meth was to blame for the tragedy.
Sotomayor also used the 2016 mass murder at the gay-friendly Pulse nightclub in Orlando Fla., to prove "significantly higher… rates of violent victimization" for LGBT people. Omar Mateen, the Pulse shooter, confirmed after the massacre that he planned to attack Disney World, was deterred by the park's police presence, and resolved to shoot up the first Google search result for "Orlando nightclubs." Although the media claimed that the Pulse shooter specifically targeted gay people, the FBI has found no evidence to prove such.
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