WASHINGTON — For years, the United States has been drifting further apart, less a single country than an uncomfortable marriage of vastly disparate cultural and political entities, a Red America and a Blue America with starkly different realities on masks and vaccines, gun rights and voting rights, Donald J. Trump and the legitimacy of the 2020 election.
Now the chasm may open even wider. If the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, as it appears poised to do, all 50 states will suddenly be free to set their own rules, leading to one America where access to an abortion is guaranteed and another where it is outlawed — and, in some cases, helping someone cross state lines to obtain one could become a crime.