VP Harris says ‘there’s so much at stake’ after Supreme Court rulings

Vice President Kamala Harris appears at the Essence Festival of Culture on Friday, at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans.

Amy Harris/Amy Harris/Invision/AP

Following a series of monumental Supreme Court rulings, Vice President Kamala Harris says fundamental issues are at stake.

The court handed down three sweeping decisions in two days, upending race-based college admissions, student loan forgiveness and LGBTQ+ protections. The cases were followed with high anticipation that the court, which has a conservative majority, could overturn decades of precedent.

“There’s so much at stake,” Harris said in an interview with NPR’s Michel Martin on Friday, hours after the Court wrapped its final day of opinions for the term. The vice president spoke to NPR after speaking at a moderated discussion on maternal health and reproductive rights at the Essence Festival in New Orleans.

The Supreme Court struck down President Biden’s $400 billion student debt relief plan, saying he exceeded his executive authority. In another Friday ruling, a conservative justice supermajority sided with a web designer who refused to create websites for same-sex weddings. A day earlier, those same six conservative justices effectively ended affirmative action, the practice of using race as a factor in college admission decisions.

Noting that the rulings arrive a year after the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion, the vice president says she sees a troubling theme that runs through the country’s highest court.

“I do believe that…