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Amanpour
Interview With UC Davis School Of Law Martin Luther King Professor Of Law And "Abortion And The Law In America" Author Mary Ziegler; Interview With Ukrainian First Deputy Foreign Minister Emine Dzhaparova; Interview With "The Shadow Docket" Author Stephen Vladeck. Aired 1-2p ET
Aired May 17, 2023 - 13:00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[13:00:00]
BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST: Hello, everyone, and welcome to "Amanpour." Here's what's coming up.
In New York, Prince Harry and Meghan involved in what's been described as a near catastrophic car chase involving the paparazzi. We unpack what we
know.
Then, the new showdown over abortion access in United States. We dig into the legal and political challenges ahead, as well as how this is affecting
American women today.
Then --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EMINE DZHAPAROVA, UKRAINIAN FIRST DEPUTY FOREIGN MINISTER: Our goal is to explain why it is crucial to be at the right side of the history.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: -- my conversation with Ukraine's deputy foreign minister, Emine Dzhaparova. She tells me why her country must free all of its territory,
including Crimea.
Also, ahead --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHEN VLADECK, AUTHOR, "THE SHADOW DOCKET": It just doesn't hold up once the Supreme Court is handing down orders in this context.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: -- the stealth rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court. Author and legal professor Stephen Vladeck tells Hari Sreenivasan how the shadow
docket is used by the court to amass power.
Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm piano Bianna Golodryga in New York sitting in for Christiane Amanpour.
Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, the duchess of Sussex, say they were in a New York catastrophic car chase here in New York City on Tuesday night. A
spokesperson for the couple saying that they and Meghan's mother, Doria Ragland, were pursued by a "ring of highly aggressive paparazzi" and that
the chase lasted more than two hours, resulting in multiple near collisions.
New York Mayor Eric Adams says the incident was reckless and irresponsible but question the duration of the chase.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR ERIC ADAMS (D-NY): I would find it hard to believe that there was a two-hour high-speed chase. That would be -- I find that hard to believe,
but we will find out the exact duration of it. But if it's 10 minutes, a ten-minute chase, is extremely dangerous in New York City. We have a lot of
traffic, a lot of movement, a lot of people are using our streets. Any type of high-speed chase that involves something of that nature is
inappropriate.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: Correspondent Melissa Bell, joins me now from Paris with the latest details. So, Melissa, start by walking us through what exactly
happened here in New York last night.
MELISSA BELL, CNN PARIS CORRESPONDENT: Well, it appears that the couple were leaving this function, Bianna, a publicize function. We can see the
pictures of the two of them there together. She and her gold dress. She was there to receive an award. It was as they left in their limousine that
these incidents unfolded.
Now, what we have managed to find out since the announcement of that news came that they had felt threatened, that they had spent two hours trying to
get free of that situation is that at no point did they themselves feel that they were any -- in any physical danger. They were afraid. They were
worried, it seems, for the bystanders, the people who are on the sidewalks as the paparazzi tried dangerously to make their way towards the limousine.
And according to them, it took them a couple hours to be extricated from that situation.
But I think what matters here is how that would have felt for Prince Harry. As you said a moment ago, we don't know exactly how long this lasted or
what the precise nature of what went on for the paparazzi watching or for New York authorities trying to keep an eye was, but from the point of view
of Harry, and this was what came through in the statement that came to the press earlier this morning, that sense of being hounded that the couple
would've had as they left the event. Bianna.
GOLODRYGA: Of course, you mentioned Prince Harry specifically, and that is a result of his mother's death, some nearly 26 years ago in the city where
you are right there in Paris. I think it's one of the first things that comes to mind for anyone who -- when they first heard this story. Even the
mayor of New York spoke about that as well, that we all called the death of Princess Diana who is being chased by paparazzi through the streets of
Paris at 26 -- nearly 26 years ago.
Talk about the parallels between this ordeal and the death of Harry's mother. He's been quite outspoken about this.
BELL: That's right. And of course, Bianna, as you point out, this is one of those moments for any of us old enough to remember that people knew exactly
where they were when they heard that Princess Diana had died. He himself was a 12-year-old boy on a holiday with his father at Balmoral. She, the
princess, was rebuilding her life with Dodi al Fayed, had come through Paris for a pit stop after spending a few days on his yacht off the French
Italian Riviera.
[13:05:00]
You have to cast your mind back here, to the last few days of August 1997. The paparazzi were in hot pursuit, any snippet they could get of her life,
any image they could get was, of course, chased after fiercely and she herself had felt hounded for years. We know this specifically from Prince
Harry's memoir as well, that he can remember as little boy her distress at being stopped in the street by the paparazzi.
It was in that context, Bianna, that she comes through Paris, extraordinary measures have been taken so that she and Dodi al Fayed, with whom she was
traveling, could leave the Ritz Hotel that belonged and belong still to Dodi al Fayed's father, Mohamed, to get to the apartment that they were
staying, a decoy car was sent, nonetheless the paparazzi tracked down the car they were traveling in.
The chaos that ensued, the dangerous driving that ensued, of course, ended in those terrible moments under the Pont de l'Alma here in Paris in the
early morning of the 31st of August 1997. Within a couple of hours by the time she got to the hospital she had died.
And, of course, so much at the time, press inquiries had been spent trying to get to the bottom of precisely what happened. And apparently, no lessons
were learned. I think that is first and foremost would've been on Prince Harry's mind.
GOLODRYGA: Yes. I too was one of those people who recall exactly where I was and what day of the week it was and what time it was when Princess
Diana died. Melissa, the fear of paparazzi is something that Harry has grappled with, his entire life. I mentioned that he's been quite outspoken
about it. I want to play a clip from an interview that he did in 2019 with ITVs' Tom Bradby where he spoke about the circumstances of his mother's
death.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM BRADBY, ITV NEWS HOST: Do you feel at peace in a way yet or is it still a sort of wound that festers?
PRINCE HARRY, DUKE OF SUSSEX: I think probably a wound that festers. I think being part of this family, in this role and in this job, every single
time I see a camera, every single time I hear a click, every single time I see a flash it takes me straight back. So, in that respect, it's the worst
reminder of her life as opposed to the best.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: That's quite a complex relationship he has with the media, right, because it's clear that he's naturally the extrovert in the family
and he is very likable and social and likes to speak with people and those who are interviewing him quite comfortably. Talk about how he manages that
natural inclination that he has also given his history though with the press and the death of his mother.
BELL: There is something of a paradox there of course. Here is a young man who has chosen to leave the privileges and obligations that went with his
function as a working royal to seek a new life in the United States to make it on his own terms, to decide on his own rules, to marry the women of his
choice, to protect her then from what he saw as a media intrusion, and yet, he finds himself still, perhaps all the more so, vulnerable to precisely
what he has witnessed his mother going through, and he had vowed to protect his wife from.
And I think it is that fragility that he would have felt last night, of being at once hounded because he's chosen to leave and less protected
because he has chosen to leave. A very similar parallel, striking really, to what his mother went through. And of course, because what we've had is a
statement from Prince Harry and Meghan themselves, we've had that perspective, the idea that those two hours he felt -- go for two hours, the
fear that they felt, we've had that account from their point of view. And I think that is colored, of course, by precisely what has been his story.
At once, a determined ambition attempt to get away from what faith had written for him and on the other, the inescapable reach somehow of
something that was bigger than him.
GOLODRYGA: Yes. And in that statement that we read from the Sussexes, you heard them plea for these photos to not be published. And I'm just curious,
given what happened after Diana's death where the images were shared and then taken down, do you think perhaps there's more caution this time
around? Because their argument would be that it incentivizes this type of action and recklessness.
BELL: That's right. On one hand, Bianna, you could imagine that it would allow everyone to get a clear idea of what exactly what went on in the
streets of Manhattan last night. We have the sense from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle of what they went through, what it actually looked like. And
of course, a lot of people would like to know more about the specific details of what they went through, how long it lasted, what it looked like,
just how intrusive it was or how much danger they or bystanders might have felt themselves in.
[13:10:00]
And on the other, of course, this is precisely the problem, is that it is those very images stolen by the paparazzi when they shouldn't be trying to
steal them that fueled this. And of course, as you mentioned, those very pictures of Diana, very gruesome pictures that were taken in the immediate
aftermath of the crash. Because, of course, bear in mind, that the paparazzi were all around. And her last few moments as she was taken from
the wreckage of the car and off to the hospital were all captured on camera.
Now, those images initially published very timidly in a couple of European publications, taken down very quickly were also at the heart of the
inquiry. Now, the United Kingdom had what was its longest and most expensive inquiry yet, trying to figure out exactly the circumstances of
Princess Diana's death. At the heart of that inquiry, Bianna, was those very images.
Now, the coroner decided at that point, unusually, that they wouldn't go up on the -- on the InQuest website because even pixelated they could be de-
pixelated to be used again. They are central at once to what the investigation was trying to figure out, but to the very cause of the
accident as well. And as a result, have been treated exam extremely cautiously ever since.
Prince Harry himself had been asked to see them. And of course, that is also a reminder of just how personally he has himself try to investigate
what his mother went through to the point of being willing to look at those pictures himself, Bianna.
GOLODRYGA: And, Melissa, before I let you go, has there been any response as of yet from Buckingham Palace?
BELL: We are waiting to hear more. For the time being, what we have heard has been very much from New York City officials responding to that
statement that was put out by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. And I think a lot of people are waiting more details about exactly what happened. No
comment for the time being.
But I think that until more details come through of exactly what happened, it's going to be really interesting to see what the palace does say if and
when it does decide to react either informally or formally to reach out to Harry and Meghan somehow, Bianna.
GOLODRYGA: Well, we are happy and relieved that no one was injured last night. And obviously, you'll continue to follow this story for us as an
investigation here into the incident continues in New York City. Melissa Bell, thank you so much.
Well, next to America's desperate fight over abortion access. Today, all eyes are on three Republican dominated judges in New Orleans. As oral
arguments begin in the case to decide whether the abortion drug, mifepristone, should be taken off the market nationwide.
The biggest abortion case since Roe v. Wade was overturned the last June. Now, if the judges do rule against the pill, it is likely that the case
will head to Supreme Court for a final decision. Joining me now on this is Mary Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California and a leading
expert on the history and the politics surrounding women's reproductive health in the United States.
Mary, welcome to the program, thank you so much for joining us today. So, before we get to what is happening in certain states in terms of abortion
rights, let me ask you more about mifepristone specifically and try to dispel some of the suggestions and innuendos and really, some of the
arguments that the plaintiffs had laid out that this is a dangerous drug for women.
We should let our viewers know that this was a drug that had FDA approval over 20 years ago and is safer than Tylenol, it is safer than even Viagra.
And my question throughout all of this was, what standing do the plaintiffs have to begin with given that this has authorized by the FDA, given its
lengthy history of being safe, and given the fact that Congress has given the FDA since 1938 and overarching authority to determine whether drugs are
safe and effective in the United States?
MARY ZIEGLER, MARTIN LUTHER KING PROFESSOR OF LAW, UC DAVIS SCHOOL OF LAW AND AUTHOR, "ABORTION AND THE LAW IN AMERICA": Yes. I mean, I think we know
that the U.S. Supreme Court, which is very conservative, has some doubts about the plaintiff's case here and I think it's likely to be on procedural
grounds.
The plaintiffs in this case are a group of conservative doctors who don't have any patients who complained about mifepristone. So, their claim is
essentially that they inevitably will have patients who complain about mifepristone, which is usually not how you get to bring a lawsuit. And they
are complaining too that their time spent suing about mifepristone has prevented them from doing other productive things, which again, is usually
not a basis for bringing a lawsuit. And usually, when you challenge something that the FDA has done, you can't wait nearly a quarter century to
do it. So, this is a very unusual case.
Procedurally, and it is unusual case in terms of how science is being handled. We are seeing essentially claims that abortion opponents in the
United States have been making about mifepristone really since the 1990s being used as a basis to revive this challenge to the drug even though the
FDA had vetted those claims 23 years ago and even though this challenge wasn't brought until 23 years ago.
[13:15:00]
So, we're dealing with something, I think, that's highly unusual and it's, I think, going to be interesting to see what the Fifth Circuit does with it
given that this a conservative panel.
GOLODRYGA: Yes. Well, let's talk about the Fifth Circuit because this is the second time that this case comes before them. Initially, it came after
the judges -- a judge in Texas' initial ruling, his first ruling. And the Justice Department appealed that judge's initial decision. And this appeals
court voted two to one to narrow but not completely block that judge, that Texas judge, Judge Kacsmaryk's ruling.
So, what can we expect to see now? Because that had ultimately gone to the Supreme Court, which had put the lower court's ruling on hold, pending
appeals. So, that's -- in layman's terms, that says that this drug will be available for the time being. That having been said, what can we expect to
see this second time around before this circuit court of appeals?
ZIEGLER: Well, it's hard to say, right? So, this is arguably an even more conservative group of justices. So, the Fifth Circuit has panels that are
random drawn. This panel is arguably even more conservative than the last one.
So, looking at that alone, we would expect those judges to have a lot of sympathy for the plaintiffs' claims. The wild card here is that the U.S.
Supreme Court did allow the status quo to stay in place. And usually, one of the factors the Supreme Court is supposed to consider in reaching a
conclusion about that is who is likely to win when the case is all said and done, and their willingness to leave the status quo in place means that
there are some skepticisms from, at least, by justices that the plaintiffs are ultimately going to win, for one reason or another.
So, the question if you're this Fifth Circuit panel and you think the plaintiffs are right, for whatever reason, is, do you push the envelope and
give the plaintiffs a big win and hope to persuade some of those conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court to change their mind? Or do
you kind of acknowledge the writing on the wall that maybe these plaintiffs don't have standing, maybe this case is to procedurally flawed and do you
kind of make the case that some of their legal arguments make sense even if this particular cause of action has to go away on some technical ground leg
standing?
GOLODRYGA: This is the most widely used form of abortion, this specific pill, and why it's gaining so much attention nationwide is that this
impacts everyone, in every state, no matter what their stance is and their laws are regarding abortion. How does that square with the Supreme Court's
decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which in their justification said that it should be up to the states?
ZIEGLER: Yes. I mean, it's -- it really didn't take long for everyone to realize that, of course, that was not going to happen, right? So, I mean,
the two major claims that the plaintiffs are making in this case are either that the FDA never had the authority to approve mifepristone in the first
place or alternatively, that the Comstock Act, which is a 19th century anti vice law bars the mailing of mifepristone and likely bars all abortion
because any abortion in the United States involve something put into the mail, whether that's a scalpel or a medication.
So, none of those arguments, obviously, allow voters in the states to make up their own mind. And of course, none of these things involve them moving
away from the federal court, right? I mean, anti-abortion groups are relying more than ever on the federal courts, in part, because I think they
understand that's where they can win.
A sort of national ban on mifepristone would be impossible to achieve I think through democratic politics and may well be possible to achieve
through rulings of conservative federal judges. So, I think it makes the Supreme Court's decision and Dobbs, suggesting this was a sort of very big
win for democracy, look either naive or dishonest, depending on your point of view.
GOLODRYGA: And the president has -- this would -- said, one can't overstate. I mean, it's one of the reasons why you have CEOs of almost
every major drug company petitioning against this ruling because once you overturn one, the FDA's approval for one drug, obviously, that could open
the door to many others in -- going forward.
Let's move on to states specifically and what's going on in North Carolina. The North Carolina Republican-led General Assembly move Tuesday to ban most
abortions after 12 weeks. Now, that has been a law that they had put in place. The Democratic governor had overturned it and vetoed. And now, this
overturns that veto. What happens now in that state for women who are seeking an abortion?
ZIEGLER: Well, it's kind of a sneaky law because the top headline is that it's a 12-week ban, but it actually limits medication, abortion even
further, right? So, the most common abortion method in North Carolina is only available until 10 weeks and it imposes some additional restrictions.
So, North Carolina regionally had been a receiving state. Most of the south in the United States has bans on abortion from fertilization. And North
Carolina, South Carolina and Florida had been the exceptions.
[13:20:00]
Florida just passed the ban at six weeks. A pregnancy which is before many people know they're pregnant. The legal fate of that bill is now up for
grabs in state courts. South Carolina's State Supreme Court had opened the door to some access by striking down the six-week ban.
And so, what happened in North Carolina will have ripple effects across the region for people who are traveling to seek abortions. And while it isn't
as extreme as a ban from fertilization or six weeks, it's still going to make abortions much harder to get. It narrows exceptions for people who
have things like life-threatening conditions, fetal abnormalities, rape or incest.
So, I think the interesting question is going to be whether even this is the stopping point in North Carolina, right, or whether this is sort of a
waste station on the road to even more stringent law? That is what I expect to see abortion opponents pushing for.
GOLODRYGA: You're right because you're seeing states really watching what other states are doing and moving forward based on that. I want to play for
our viewers some real-life examples of the implication some of these state laws have on real-life stories and women and how they are affected.
Here is a woman, a teacher from Texas, who had to go seek an emergency abortion in a neighboring state because of the newly enacted law in Texas.
Let's play some sound for her.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAILEE DESPAIN, FORCED TO SEEK ABORTION ACROSS STATE LINES: How could you be so cruel as to pass a law that you know will hurt women and that you
know will cause babies to be born in pain? He was going to die a painful death. So, how is that humane? How is that saving anybody?
And I just remember being so angry and shocked in that moment that I'm being told that my child is not going to survive and that I have to carry
him to term no matter what and I've never felt more betrayed by a place that was once so proud to be from.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: And that is just one woman's story. And obviously, this isn't just a women's issue too, this is a family issue. And on the one hand, you
do have abortion opponents saying that there are carve-outs in these laws that allow for doctors to save the life of women. That having been said,
you do see real-life examples, almost on the daily basis, of doctors and the legal teams at hospitals not wanting to address these women and their
issues because they are afraid of lawsuits. Can you give us a few examples of what you've seen and heard of?
ZIEGLER: Yes. I mean, I think what you're seeing essentially is that a lot of these laws, like the North Carolina law is a good example, have language
that's designed for criminal courts, right? So, they will say things like a permanent and -- or substantial impermeant of this -- of the important
bodily function. I am paraphrasing.
This isn't language doctors would use. And so, doctors are not really sure what the language means. And then, on the other side of the ledger (ph) or
the penalties, right? So, in some -- in Texas, for example, performing an abortion if you're wrong about the application of an exemption can land you
in prison up to life in prison, right, and it's a felony in every case.
And if you're a physician, you're looking at this and saying, OK, if I'm wrong, if my interpretation of this legal language I don't understand is
incorrect, I could lose my medical license, I could lose my liberty, I could not see my family for at least a decade, right? And it's not
surprising that doctors are not willing to roll the dice on that.
And so, even when you have these exceptions, if you couple the exceptions with really severe penalties, you are going to see a lot of people being
turned away when they're seeking care, and that's not going to just include people seeking abortions, it's going to include, in many of these states,
the cases we're hearing, are people who had wanted pregnancies that lost those pregnancies, stillbirths, miscarriage, management cases, other people
who are being affected by this. And I think these are unintended consequences, but they are not surprising. When you couple vague language
and harsh penalties this is what you get.
GOLODRYGA: Yes. We should note, as we conclude this conversation, mifepristone is also a widely used drug for women who are experiencing a
miscarriage as well. NO, doubt this is a hotbed issue as we are turning to the election season once again. We will continue, obviously, to cover this
topic closely.
Mary Ziegler, thank you so much for joining us and helping explain it for our viewers. We appreciate it.
ZIEGLER: Thanks for having me.
GOLODRYGA: Well, now, we turn to Ukraine where Russian shelling is hammering the front lines. The country's leaders are continuing to appeal
for help as the war drags on. On the back of President Zelenskyy's whistlestop European tour, First Lady Zelenska has been in South Korea
asking for further nonlethal military aid.
Earlier today, I spoke about this with Ukrainian Deputy Foreign Minister Emine Dzhaparova. We also discussed her campaign to ensure Ukraine gets
back the territory Crimea, and how that goal is tied to a painful family history.
[13:25:00]
Deputy Foreign Minister Dzhaparova, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us today.
An important G7 meeting it set to begin this Friday. And we know the President Zelenskyy is expected to address this summit. Can you give us
more insight into what we can expect to hear from him?
EMINE DZHAPAROVA, UKRAINIAN FIRST DEPUTY FOREIGN MINISTER: Something that he is already been vocalizing since the full-fledged invasion in 24th of
February started. I think that his speech will be about Ukraine, where we are today, what we need to be much more efficient in our fight against
evil, I would say.
This is about weapons supply, it's about economic support, it's about those projects that we have developed in terms of the recovery and rebuilt. I
think it's also important to understand there's a future (ph). There is also this hope for Ukrainian people in terms of knowing that this future
will come because, unfortunately, when we live under the circumstances of war, you cannot feel the ground beneath your feet and it kind of -- you
cannot plan. So, I think that recovery is also important. So, I think that he also will address this.
But most importantly, to my knowledge, that he also wants to reflect on is the Global South. There is a priority that he instructed us with -- I mean,
the Ukrainian diplomacy with regards to Global South. What we have a strong feeling about is that the dominant narrative today that covers almost all
Global South countries, be it in Latin America or Africa or Asia is that this war is provoked, but this war is justified with the NATO enlargement,
which I believe can be destroyed by matter-of-fact of invasion in 2014 to Crimea, when we never had NATO discussion and we never had article and
constitutions saying that our foreign policy goal is to be a full-fledged member of NATO.
And Global South narrative is also about kind of being one nation with Russia or Russkiy mir kind of being a part of this Russian world. So, I
think that it's crucial to be the firsthand information and the source of information in that explaining our course. So, President Zelenskyy's
participation in that event and he's speech and his words will be directed at explaining where we are, what we are fighting for, who we are as a
nation, what do we want and why it's crucial to support Ukraine.
GOLODRYGA: Yes. It's important that you brought up the Global South because we've spent so much of this time talking about the alliance, the western
alliance and its support for Ukraine financially and militarily. And the Global South, I would say, in bulk has taken more of a stance of
neutrality.
Christiane Amanpour just recently spoke with the Brazilian foreign minister about why the country is not providing military aid to Ukraine. And I know
you were recently in India as well trying to persuade officials there for more aid. Why do you think, up to this point, we haven't seen more of these
countries come to the defense publicly, vocally and financially of Ukraine?
DZHAPAROVA: I believe that every country, without exception, has been guided by its own national interest. And sometimes, I mean, with due
respect to those countries and their national interests for Ukraine, and it's crucial to explain why it is important to support.
So, our goal is to explain why it is crucial to be at the right side of the history. We do that with China, we do that with India. It's not something
that -- we have a tailored approach to this, of that country. It's something that we, unfortunately, live in, this is the war and this is the
suffering that we have as a society and -- so, it's something that we are friend (ph), and as my president say, I don't have time for diplomacy, I'm
very straight to the point to any leader that visits him.
So, he's very straight to the point saying that what should be done in order to help Ukraine, to fight with this evil and, you know, moreover, I
would say, it's not about Ukraine only, because if -- let us imagine if Putin achieve his goal.
GOLODRYGA: Right.
DZHAPAROVA: Then the other issue would be raised is, if someone or anyone can be secured, because we are talking about P5 country, the country that
has huge army, country that many times bigger than Ukraine is. And then, if we all, as humanity, allow this to happen, it means other countries will
never be secured.
GOLODRYGA: A longer-term goal for Ukraine, obviously, post victory in this war is to join NATO and the E.U. Now, last year Ukraine was given E.U.
candidacy status in 2022, but obviously there are a lot of provisions and requirements that must be met to join the E.U. ultimately after the war.
And one of them is to confront corruption.
[13:30:00]
And I know that's something that President Zelenskyy has been tackling. But just recently, the head of Ukraine Supreme Court was dismissed. He was
suspected of taking $2.7 million worth of bribes. I believe there was a photo even of piles of dollars lined up on a sofa. What is your government
doing, really, to stamp out this issue and what is his arrest symbolize?
DZHAPAROVA: Well, I think that to tackle this very specific question, you might also talk to other of my colleagues because I am not the one who is
dealing with anti-corruption in the government. But it's my personal feeling that this case when the anti-corruption body revealed this huge
level of corruption in the judicial system is super important in terms of the -- as a showcase of something that we fight as a domestic enemy, not
only the foreign enemy that we have with regards to Russia, but also this post-Soviet remnant, I would say, that we fight as a society.
And I think and I hope that those anti-corruption bodies that we launched, the agency, the anti-corruption agency or the bureau, the anti-corruption
bureau or the reform that we started, the judicial reform, even though it's sometimes not ideal because it might take years, and we have many European
countries that are still reforming their judicial system. So, it's something that we started back in 2014, as I -- which I call global
reconstruction.
Education system is under reform. Health care system is under reform. Decentralization is yet another important reform with the logic to give
some power to the regions and local authorities because they will always better know what do people need in the regions. So, this is a global
reconstruction that we started back in 2014.
And of course, the mother of this reform is anti-corruption reform. There are a bunch of laws that have been adopted by the parliament in terms of --
to tackle this anti-corruption process. But then, you know, at the end of the day, it's always about culture.
Because when we speak about these reforms it's not only on paper you see, it's not only the law that has been providing these or that article, it's
about the culture of people. And I think that this culture of being European nation has been crystallized by the war because we do pay the
highest price possible for that, price of our lives.
We understand that this might take long, but this is something that is super crucial in terms of us to be -- and to live in the country that we
all dream about, prosperous, democratic and transparent.
GOLODRYGA: Well, speaking of culture, I do want to talk to you about your specific background, and on a larger scale, the insignificance of what
tomorrow is. May 18th, it's the anniversary of Stalin's expulsion of Crimean Tatars from the homeland in 1944. I believe there were some 200,000
that were expelled to mainland Russia there, in the eastern part of the country.
This is your background. You are a Crimean Tatars as well. And once again, the community there has been uprooted after the 2014 annexation, the
illegal annexation by Russia of Crimea. Again, about 10 percent of the Tatars there move to the mainland area.
You yourself were affected. Talk about the significance of this date and of Crimean culture and the Tatars there and their history on that important
land.
DZHAPAROVA: Thank you for this question. I think that if anyone wants to understand the nature of the current crime of Putin beating Crimea or any
other part of Ukraine, you can only refer to the history of Crimean Tatars people, and it will be a book or instruction of what Russia is been
committing today because it has been systematically doing so for centuries Crimean Tatars, for example.
You know, there are three main pillars when we talk about Crimea Tatars. The historical one. That means the first annexation that happened in 18th
century, when in 1783, Catherine II annexed Crimea for the first time. She started do approximately the same as Putin commits today or Stalin
committed in 1944, she started to oppress those Crimean Tatars who were not ready to accept the Russians. Within 100 years after, one third of
indigenous population left the peninsula.
The second pillar is 1944, 18th of May. And let me bring you -- bring to your attention that it happened half a year before Yalta Peace Conference
took place in 1945, when the world leaders came to Crimea and pretended that nothing happened with Crimean Tatars. Nobody said a word about the
fate of Crimean Tatars because as this deportation happened when Crimean Tartars men were fighting within the red army against Nazi Germany, Crimean
Tatars women, children and seniors were put into cattle shed wagons and into unknown directions in Central Asia.
[13:35:00]
And many people died. Every second, Crimean Tatars died, and it -- this put us to the threat of physical existence. And then, Stalin and the Soviets,
what they did, they resettled Russian people from other parts of Russia to Crimea.
And in 2014, when Putin invaded Crimea, he claimed that these are Russian people living in Crimea and this is a traditional land of Crimea. But it's
not about justice, because when we speak about Crimea and its population and its indigenous population, these are Crimean Tatars and this is why
Putin, in 2014, started to oppress Crimean Tatars because it's a bone in his throat. It's something that does not allow him to joust (ph) his crime
in Crimea.
Deportations, kidnappings, prosecutions, labeling Crimean Tatars as Muslim extremists, but as a matter of fact, we never had terrorist attack before
2014. So, this reality today in Crimea, a present reality, is something that used to be in 18th of May 1924 or 18th century by Catherine II, the
Russian reality in Crimea is always about evil.
So, of course, for Ukraine, it's crucial to follow international law because directly says that Crimea is an integral part of Ukraine.
GOLODRYGA: Emine Dzhaparova, thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate you coming on and joining us today.
DZHAPAROVA: Thank you.
GOLODRYGA: Well, as mentioned earlier, that crucial abortion pill case may be heading to the U.S. Supreme Court at a time when trust in the
institution is very low. Our next guest says part of the reason is the rise of the shadow docket, where cases are decided quickly without written
opinions or oral arguments. Law professor, Stephen Vladeck, traces how it's changing the Supreme Court in his new book, and he joins Hari Sreenivasan
to discuss these stealth rulings.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HARI SREENIVASAN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Stephen Vladeck, thanks so much for joining us. Your book is titled "The Shadow Docket: How the
Supreme Court Uses Stealth Rulings to Amass Power and Undermine the Republic." First of all, maybe a little bit of a civics primer for all of
us, what is a shadow docket?
STEPHEN VLADECK, AUTHOR, "THE SHADOW DOCKET": Yes. So, it's not really much more than just an umbrella term for most of what the U.S. Supreme Court
does. We tend to talk about the merits docket, that is to say the 60 to 65 decisions the court hands down each term, applicants (ph) have been argued.
But in reality, that's just a small slice of the overall applicant (ph) of the Supreme Court.
The shadow docket is a term that was coined by a Chicago professor in 2015 to describe everything else the Supreme Court does, the unsigned and
usually unexplained orders that actually account for most of the Supreme Court's work and that can oftentimes be just as consequential and just as
impactful as the big fancy merits decisions that we actually tend to focus on in the -- you know, in our public discussions.
SREENIVASAN: Right. We forget that the Supreme Court probably, what, rejects most of the cases that come to it, right? It's not -- it's a very
small fraction that they even choose to hear. So, how, as a refresher -- how do the cases get to the Supreme Court before they go down either the
shadow docket or the merit case route?
VLADECK: Right. So, the typical lawsuit usually gets the Supreme Court at the very end of litigation. So, after years of back and forth in lower
courts, whether lower federal courts, lower state courts. And usually, it's only at the very, very end that whoever lost in the last round will go to
the U.S. Supreme Court and ask the justices to take up the appeal.
As you say, the justices can choose whether or not to take up the case. One of the things that we've seen though in recent years is another type of
order where even before we get to that point, before the case has made it all the way through, a party that lost below say the federal government
that had one of its policies enjoined or someone challenge on a state COVID measure who lost in the lower courts might go to the Supreme Court early in
the case and asked for something called emergency ruling, you're asking the justices basically to freeze the status quo or to unfreeze the status quo
while the rest of that litigation process plays out.
That's where we have seen a real uptick in the last five or six years in how often the justices are granting that kind of relief in the impact of
orders, granting them that kind of relief, and in where those impacts have been felt by all of us, from federal vaccination mandates, to state
abortion bans, to congressional district maps. We really have seen these kinds of orders reshape large swaths of American public policy.
SREENIVASAN: So, I want to go through each of those categories one by one. I want to point a quote that you wrote, as the shadow docket has grown, the
merits docket has shrunk, giving the justices less time and fewer resources with which to conduct plenary review cases not presenting real or conjure
emergencies.
So, let's talk about the frequency. How often are these types of one sentence, one paragraph, rulings happening?
VLADECK: Yes. I mean, we're seeing them just about every week now. Now, again, we should distinguish between when the court is granting or denying
review of a full appeal. So, that superiority (ph). Those, of course, happen all the time, and there are thousands of those every year.
[13:40:00]
But on the emergency side, we are now seeing somewhere between 75 to 100 of these rulings each term. We are seeing the court grant somewhere between 15
and 25 of these per term. And just to put that in context, the court is not even taking 75 to 100 merits cases each time. The last four terms, it's
been around 60. And the number of times we're seeing the justices intervene through emergency applications, 15 to 25 per term, that is way up in both
number and qualitative assessment from as recently as 10 years ago.
10 years ago, maybe the justices would have intervened, five, six, seven times a term. And those interventions would have almost all been in the
death penalty cases, where what was happening -- where the emergency was, a last-minute request to block an execution or from a state to unblock an
execution. Now, we are seeing these emergency requests on questions of statewide or federal policy, everything from the student loan program, to
the Title 42 immigration policy, to COVID medication measures.
SREENIVASAN: So, how long are these decisions and what do they typically say? What did the Supreme Court justices share about why they got to a
particular decision?
VLADECK: Usually, nothing, and that's the problem. I mean, so, the typical disposition is something like the application for a stay presented to
Justice Alito and by him refer to the court is granted. That's it. You know, we might get concurring opinions, we might get some dissenting
opinions, but it really is the exception that the court will write a majority opinion when it hands down these orders.
And, historically, that's not unusual. You know, 20 years ago when all the court was doing through emergency applications was last-minute stays of
execution, I don't think there was a big clamor for the justices to provide lengthy explanations. But now that these orders are having these profound
effects on the ground, the fact that we see the court intervening, oftentimes undoing hundreds of pages of analysis from other court judges
and providing no explanation of its own, I think it's a real part of the problem and it deprives all of us, the lower courts, the relevant
government decision-makers, the public of any ability to assess why the justices ruled the way they did.
SREENIVASAN: Justice Alito has kind of pushed back on this idea in multiple ways. One of the quotes you have from him is, the catchy and sinister term
'shadow docket' has been used to portray the court as having been captured by a dangerous cabal that resorts to sneaky and improper methods to get its
way.
He obviously doesn't like, not just the phrasing, but the entire concept that the court is doing something untoward. And you take almost an entire
chapter to try to push back against that. What's your evidence against what he saying?
VLADECK: Well, I think the evidence is the decisions. I mean -- and so, for example, one of Justice Alito's responses to critiques, I've been critical
of the fact that the court is treating some of these orders as presidential and yelling at lower courts that have not followed unsigned unexplained
orders. You know, Justice Alito denies they are doing that, but we can point to the specific cases where it's happened.
So, I think part of what's going on here is that for Justice Alito's perspective all the court is doing is what it had always done in the death
penalty context and just in a slightly different context. And what that totally fails to acknowledge and fails to account for is why it's
problematic that the court is not explaining itself, that we are not seeing rational, is that we're not even seeing the vote count.
I mean, we don't even know which justices are on which side in a lot of these contexts when the decision is happening with these downstream
effects, when the decision is affecting who is voted for for Congress, as we saw in the congressional redistricting cases, when the decision is
affecting whether or not a controversial immigration policy will be allowed to be enforce for upwards of two to three years, when the decision is
blocking California or New York COVID mitigation measures.
And so, I think this is where the Alito critique fails to account for what the court is actually doing. What he is defending as a strawman, and if you
actually look at the whole body of these cases, just what the book does, you really see a far more troubling pattern not of conservative versus
liberals, but of a court that just seems to be unbeholden to any need to explain itself, even when these decisions are having such massive effects.
SREENIVASAN: The part that you are also concerned about is this precedent setting nature of these, really, unexplained decisions. And tell me and the
audience, why that's important?
VLADECK: To put it sort of more playing terms of why these matters, if we go back to why we, as a polity, give all of this power to unelected judges,
it's because we expect them to act in a way that is judicious and judicial.
[13:45:00]
And at the heart of judicial power, what separates judges from politicians in robes is the principled rationale, is the ability of the courts to
provide justifications for why they are ruling one way and not the other.
The Supreme Court itself has always said, our power comes from our ability to provide principled explanations. When you don't have those explanations,
what you're missing is not necessarily principles who would agree, we might disagree with the principles that the court is adopting in cases like Dobbs
or Bruen, when it comes to abortion or guns. But they are principles. And what is missing in the unsigned unexplained orders is any sense that the
justices are ruling the way they are because of fidelity to some kind of neutral legal rule as opposed to because they want party A to win and party
B to lose.
And one of the most disturbing things we see when we look at all of these cases in the aggregate is that there's really seldom a coherent legal
through line that explains why, in some cases, the court rules one way, in some cases it rules the other. Oftentimes the best predictor is whether the
case has a partisan balance. And if it does, we've seen the court tend to favor Republicans, tend to rule against Democrats.
SREENIVASAN: So, is there a partisan effect on when these unsigned decisions increased in volume?
VLADECK: There's certainly, I think, an alignment and there's a correlation between the shift and the change in membership on the Supreme Court. I
think it's harder to prove causation. But we really see this pattern start to pick up in 2017, before there were any big changes in the court's
composition in the middle of the Trump administration. And then, it's with the confirmation of Justice Kavanaugh to replace Justice Kennedy with the
confirmation of Justice Barrett to replace Justice Ginsburg, that's when we see it really accelerate.
I don't think that's because these are conservative as opposed to liberal justices. I think it's because the speed breaks, the sort of the moderating
influence of having justices like Anthony Kennedy who is in the middle were removed.
And so, the court, I think, has just found it more and more convenient to use these unsigned unexplained orders to resolve more and more these
applications. Not necessarily intentionally, but in a way that has produced all the significant downstream effects.
SREENIVASAN: When we think about these emergency applications, a lot of people will understand the idea of death penalty cases. And the Supreme
Court had a finding late in the '70s about this. What does that do to the context of where we are today?
VLADECK: In response to the reinstituting of the death penalty in the 1970s, we see the court move towards resolving all remotely contentious
emergency applications as a full court. And we see the court move away from having oral arguments on emergency applications, having expended briefing,
writing opinions.
And I think what got lost in the history is that, for 35 years, those moves, which I think are deeply problematic, we're confined to the unique
space of the death penalty. And so, we didn't really talk about it much. We didn't notice it much.
You ask people who clerked on the Supreme Court in the 1980s and 1990s about the shadow docket, what they remember is the death docket. The real
shift, right? The move that the book tries to document from 2016 and '17 onwards is all of these pathologies that have come to mark how the Supreme
Court handled last-minute applications in the death penalty context have become normalized into context that have nationwide policy implications,
whether it's about President Trump building his border wall or whether it's about the attempt to ban access to mifepristone on a nationwide basis.
And I think even if that move in the early 1980s was remotely justifiable in the death penalty context, it just doesn't hold up once the Supreme
Court is handing down orders in this context that are having such massive legal and practical impacts on the real world.
SREENIVASAN: I know that Justice Alito is opposed to the idea. Did you have a chance to speak to any of the justices about this practice or have they
been making statements that you can cite on the record about how they feel about this?
VLADECK: So, I mean, I think the best evidence we have is what they have been writing publicly. And so, Justice Kagan, I think, has been leading the
criticisms of how the conservative majority has been using the shadow docket. She's now written, I think, four separate dissenting opinions in
some of these cases where she's called out not just the result but the procedural shortcuts that the majority was taking.
But I actually think the most interesting figure here is Chief Justice John Roberts. Roberts, who I think, is deeply sympathetic to the results the
court is reaching in all of these cases, has been dissenting a lot with the other -- with -- you know, with Democratic appointed justices.
[13:50:00]
In the Texas abortion case, in the Alabama redistricting case, in a clean water case from April, 2022. And in that last one, in the April 22 clean
water case, he actually joined Justice Kagan's dissenting opinion to accuse the five other conservative justices of taking procedural shortcuts.
And I think this is such an important point because it really underscores why criticism of the court's behavior is not necessarily partisan. You can
be a -- you know, died in the more conservative judge, like John Roberts, and still think that there's a right way for the Supreme Court to hand on
these rulings and a wrong way for the court to hand down these rulings.
Now, I think the fact that Roberts has been publicly critical is such a telling part of the story.
SREENIVASAN: So, what is the check that exists on the Supreme Court, perhaps a check that we are not exercising today that we use to find normal
because these are lifetime appointed justices, and at some point, there is a decreased confidence in how they're doing their jobs?
VLADECK: Yes. I mean, this is, I think, a big part of where we are. And in that respect, I think the rise of the shadow docket is actually just a
symptom of a broader disease. This is where I think we also have to bring in all these stories about the justices' ethics and financial disclosure.
Historically, the principled checked on the court was Congress. Indeed, until 1935, the Supreme Court sat in the capital. And I think part of what
has gotten us to where we are is that, progressively and especially in the last 35 years, Congress has basically taking its hands off and had gotten
out of the business of being part of this ongoing interbranch dialogue about keeping the court in its lane.
So, when John Roberts writes back to Illinois Senator Dick Durbin and says, I'm not going to come testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee because
of separation of powers concerns, I think that's a reflection of a very modern and not remotely historical view of the separation of powers.
Historically, the court was part of the conversation as opposed to today where it seems so completely above and oblivious to it.
SREENIVASAN: What's happened to our public confidence in the Supreme Court over the past few years?
VLADECK: I mean, if you look at, at least, the survey data that's out there, it's going down. And I think this is a bigger problem than the
justices really, I think, want to admit publicly. It's not that the Supreme Court should be guided by public opinion polls and it's not that the
Supreme Court should just do what a popular majority wants it to do, but the Supreme Court does not have an army, right?
The reason why we as a polity follow the Supreme Court is because there's, at least, some substantial belief in the court's legitimacy as an
institution. The more that the belief erodes, the more that we lose faith in the idea that the justices are exercising judicial power as opposed to
political power.
I think the more dangerous a slope this means we're on. Because if we get to a point where there are large swaths of the population that refused to
accept the legitimacy of decisions from the Supreme Court, then the Supreme Court, at that point, becomes almost a pointless institution, one that
can't stand up when we need it to do to the majority. That would be a huge problem for our constitutional system and it's one that, frankly, the
justices should be at the front of the line in trying to avoid.
But from the perspective of the court as an overall institution, we see a bit more of a historical ebb and flow that suggest that our current moment,
however frustrating and exasperating it may be, is not one from which we can't recover. What we need though is we need to have consensus that the
court, as an institution, ought to be more accountable, that Congress ought to be more involved in relationship with the court about its docket, that
the justices should be more committed to providing principled rationales for their decisions, even if we're not all going to agree with them.
And finally, that the justices should, I think, be less in the business of criticizing critics who are worried about the court, who are trying to save
the court from itself. That's why, I think, this is such an important moment for the court, but also one that has a lot of -- sort of, a lot
time, a lot of games still be played.
SREENIVASAN: Professor Stephen Vladeck from the University of Austin, and author of the book, "The Shadow Docket," thanks so much for joining us
VLADECK: Thank you for having me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLODRYGA: And finally, a surprise left from none other than Pablo Picasso himself. This painting of his depicts Paris in 1900. But watch those
figures in the foreground and you will see that they're actually joined by one more. Experts at New York's Guggenheim Museum have uncovered a furry
friend hidden beneath the painting surface, even adorned with his own little red bow. You see that cute little puppy? Makes me love Pablo Picasso
even more. What a treat.
[13:55:00]
Well, that is it for now. You can always catch us online, on our podcast and across social media. Thank you so much for watching and goodbye from
New York.
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