On December 1, during oral argument in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the six conservative members of the Supreme Court made clear that the court was prepared to eviscerate the legal right to abortion. It wasn’t particularly surprising stuff, unfortunately — until Amy Coney Barrett piped up with a question out of far-right field. Her remarks pointed to the anti-abortion movement’s long game: a campaign to re-stigmatize unwed motherhood and abortion, aided unwittingly by pro-choice Democrats. Regardless of how closely the court hews to the draft opinion leaked on May 2, Barrett’s December remarks foreshadow coming attacks on reproductive freedom.

“I have a question about safe haven laws,” Barrett asked the lawyer for the abortion clinic. Helpfully explaining for the uninitiated what on earth she was talking about, she said that “in all 50 states, you can terminate parental rights by relinquishing a child” — that is, abandon a baby anonymously at police and fire stations, hospitals, and the like, without fear of prosecution. She noted that the court decisions establishing the right to abortion all emphasize the burdens of forced parenting, yet the “safe haven” laws allow women to opt out of parenting.

With a weird sideswipe, Barrett simultaneously acknowledged and dispatched the burden of forced pregnancy, as “an infringement on bodily autonomy, you know . . . like vaccines.” Then she got right to the point: Didn’t safe haven laws solve the problem of unwanted pregnancies, making abortion unnecessary and Roe’s protections irrelevant?