Molly Wecker, a second-year medical student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, had long planned to be an obstetrics-gynecology doctor in her home state. But with the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling last week, the Rock County native is rethinking her plan.
Goodson Vue is associate director of the University of Wisconsin PEOPLE program, which has enrolled more than 1,000 students on scholarships to UW-Madison. Vue, who is Hmong, coordinates the College Scholar program, supporting students through their time at the university.
“We’ll help them navigate those in the same manner we have throughout the whole period before this decision was released; obviously, some choices are more complicated than they were in the past,” said executive director Jake Baggott.
Newsweek asked two experts —retired judge Nancy Gertner and assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School Joshua Braver—to explain whether adding more justices to the Supreme Court is possible at all, how likely such a move is to succeed and why some Democrats are asking for it to happen, while others oppose it.
It’s an issue about which UW-Madison Assistant Professor of Population Health Sciences and Obstetrics and Gynecology Tiffany Green is passionate. “We know that it’s going to disproportionately affect the people already affected,” Green said. “Black pregnant people, and likely indigenous pregnant people.”
Newman, a graduate from the University of Wisconsin-Madison who has offered support for a $15 minimum wage and the Green New Deal, has disputed certain aspects of the allegations and the House Ethics Committee investigated the alleged scandal. In a unanimous vote, the Office of Congressional Ethics signaled there was reason to believe Newman had made the employment promise.
