Why saying Roe v. Wade is 'settled' isn't saying much By Ariane de Vogue, CNN Supreme Court Reporter Updated 1058 GMT (1858 HKT) September 3, 2018

Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, left, shakes hands with President Donald Trump on Monday, July 9.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh stands by his wife, Ashley, and their daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret, as Trump introduces him at the White House.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is President Trump's second nominee for the Supreme Court. His first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, was confirmed last year to replace Antonin Scalia.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is joined by his wife and US President George W. Bush as Justice Anthony Kennedy swears him in to be a federal judge in June 2006. Kavanaugh once clerked for Kennedy and now could be the judge to replace him on the Supreme Court.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is flanked by US Sens. Mitch McConnell, left, and Bill Frist during a news conference in Washington in May 2006. Kavanaugh had been nominated by Bush in 2003, but it took nearly three years until he was confirmed by a Senate vote of 57-36.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh testifies during his confirmation hearing in 2006.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is joined by family members during Capitol Hill proceedings in 2006. From left are his father, Ed Kavanaugh; his mother, Martha; his wife, Ashley; and his daughter Margaret.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Senators listen to Kavanaugh's testimony during his confirmation hearing in 2006.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee in April 2004.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh stands behind National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice as President George W. Bush, right, reviews his State of the Union speech in January 2004.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh sits behind Kenneth Starr as Starr testifies before a House committee in November 1998. Kavanaugh worked on Starr's investigation of President Bill Clinton.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

From left, Deputy Independent Counsel John Bates, Starr and Kavanaugh meet in the Office of the Solicitor General during the Whitewater investigation in November 1996.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, left, shakes hands with President Donald Trump on Monday, July 9.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh stands by his wife, Ashley, and their daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret, as Trump introduces him at the White House.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is President Trump's second nominee for the Supreme Court. His first nominee, Neil Gorsuch, was confirmed last year to replace Antonin Scalia.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is joined by his wife and US President George W. Bush as Justice Anthony Kennedy swears him in to be a federal judge in June 2006. Kavanaugh once clerked for Kennedy and now could be the judge to replace him on the Supreme Court.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh is flanked by US Sens. Mitch McConnell, left, and Bill Frist during a news conference in Washington in May 2006. Kavanaugh had been nominated by Bush in 2003, but it took nearly three years until he was confirmed by a Senate vote of 57-36.

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Photos: In pictures: Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh

Kavanaugh testifies during his confirmation hearing in 2006.

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Washington (CNN)When Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican who supports abortion rights, emerged from her office last month after her first meeting with Judge Brett Kavanaugh, reporters listened closely trying to divine whether she would back President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee.

Where Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh stands on key issues

Her vote, in a closely divided Senate, could help to determine not only Kavanaugh's fate, but the future of Roe v. Wade, the historic 1973 opinion that legalized abortion. Although the opinion was decided more than 40 years ago, it remains a lightning rod in modern confirmation hearings as senators on each side of the issue have tried to press nominees to tip their hands.

Abortion opponents hope that Kavanaugh will provide a fifth vote on a court decision to either overturn Roe or weaken the decision. The stakes are high. Kavanaugh has never opined directly on the case, but if confirmed, he will fill the seat of Justice Anthony Kennedy, who was a key swing vote on the issue of abortion restrictions.

To reporters, Collins suggested that she thought Kavanaugh respected Roe because he told her that it was "settled law."

"He said that he agreed with what (Chief) Justice (John) Roberts said at his nomination hearing in which he said it was settled law," Collins said.

But in reality, as both sides of the issue know, using the word "settled" isn't saying much.

In fact, any potential nominee asked about almost any Supreme Court case will likely say it's "settled." What they don't usually say is that while a lower court nominee must accept Supreme Court precedent, a sitting justice does not. They can vote to unsettle it.

Earlier this year, for instance, the court overturned a 40-year-old precedent when it delivered a blow to public sector unions in striking down an Illinois law that required non-union workers to pay fees that go to collective bargaining.

In Kavanaugh's hearings that start Tuesday, Democrats want to push Kavanaugh on abortion.

"It's not enough for Brett Kavanaugh to say that Roe is 'settled law,'" Sen. Dianne Feinstein said a tweet after Collins' comments.

"Chief Justice Roberts said the same thing in 2005," the California Democrat added. "Then he voted in favor of a law that would have forced 75% of Texas clinics to close. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

Indeed, during his confirmation hearings Roberts, like other conservatives Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch, said that Roe was settled.

Conservative campaign for Kavanaugh targets red-state Dems 02:49

"It's settled as a precedent of the Court, entitled to respect," Roberts testified in 2005. But in her tweet, Feinstein referred to the fact that in 2016, Roberts dissented when the court struck down parts of a Texas law that would have shuttered all but a handful of clinics in the state.

At his confirmation hearing in 2006, Alito said that Roe had "been on the books for a long time" and had been reaffirmed by the justices. Gorsuch, Trump's first nominee to the bench, said last year that Planned Parenthood v. Casey, an opinion that reaffirmed the core holding of Roe, is "settled law."

Supporters of abortion rights suggested Collins had been snookered.

"With all due respect to Sen. Collins, 'settled law' means nothing, said Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. "It's a bunch of code words, long used by many conservative judges, meant to hide their real beliefs and anti-choice record."

Meanwhile, opponents of abortion are optimistic that Kavanaugh will vote in their favor. Trump, after all, promised In a 2016 CBS interview that his "judges will be pro-life."

After Collins' comments, Catherine Glenn Foster, president of Americans United for Life, a group that opposes abortion, said that Kavanaugh was "only restating the position the Supreme Court has taken in Roe."

And in an interview with CNN's Dana Bash on Sunday, Sen. Lindsay Graham, a staunchly anti-abortion Republican from South Carolina, acknowledged that saying a case is "settled" doesn't mean it can't be overturned.

"Well, here's what I hope he will do," Graham said. "If there's a case before him that challenges Roe v. Wade, that he would listen to both sides of the story, apply a test to overturn precedent," Graham said. "Precedent is important, but not inviolate," he said.

Man shot after pulling gun outside Ice Cube concert, sheriff says By Amanda Watts and Susannah Cullinane, CNN Updated 1015 GMT (1815 HKT) September 3, 2018 Police cordon off the area where shots were fired.

Police cordon off the area where shots were fired.

(CNN)Sheriff's deputies shot a man who opened fire outside an Ice Cube concert venue after being told the show was sold out, according to the San Diego County, California, Sheriff's Department.

The man had been trying to buy a ticket to the concert featuring the rapper Sunday at the Del Mar Fairgrounds in San Diego, the department said in a statement.

He approached a ticket window about 6:40 p.m. local time (9:40 p.m. ET) and was told no more tickets were available, it said.

"An argument ensued at the gate and nearby deputies responded. The man pulled out a silver plated semi-automatic handgun and fired several shots into a crowded area. Deputies engaged and returned fire," the statement said.

Law enforcement at the fairgrounds after the shooting.

Witnesses said the man had fired three shots and that sheriff's deputies had tried to stop him with a Taser before opening fire, CNN affiliate CBS 8 reported.

A video posted to social media appeared to show a deputy firing four shots at a man who collapsed in front of a ticket window as bystanders exclaimed. A man in a black and white uniform with a walkie-talkie on his belt was then shown trying to restrain another man.

Separate footage on Twitter captured sheriff's deputies attempting to resuscitate a man lying on the ground.

The sheriff's department said the alleged gunman shot by deputies was taken to Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla. No one else is believed to have been injured in the incident.

The department later identified the suspect as 22-year-old Daniel Elizarraras of Escondido. Elizarraras is in stable condition and expected to survive, the sheriff's department said.

"The shooting is currently being investigated by the Sheriff's Homicide Unit," the department said in a statement. "The involved deputies were not injured."

Del Mar Racetrack, where the Ice Cube concert is being held tweeted: "The situation has been contained. The concert is moving forward as planned."

CNN affiliate 10News reported that the concert began at 8:30 p.m

Four people missing and several injured after boat collision in California

By Nicole Chavez and Amanda Watts, CNN

Updated 0710 GMT (1510 HKT) September 3, 2018

Boat collision

(CNN)Four people are missing after two boats collided on the Colorado River along the California-Arizona border, sheriff's department officials said Sunday.

Nine people also were injured in the crash, two critically, the Mohave County Sheriff's Department said in a statement.

The crash happened Saturday on the Colorado River between Pirate Cove Resort & Marina in Needles, California and the Topock Marina in Topock, Arizona, north of Lake Havasu, officials said.

The sheriff's department said the boats -- one northbound and carrying 10 people and the other southbound and occupied by six people -- collided head on.

All those aboard both boats were thrown into the water and both boats sank, the sheriff's department said in its statement, adding that some people were rescued from the water by passing boaters. None of the people on board either of the boats was wearing a life jacket, Mohave County Sheriff Doug Schuster said.

Rescue crews arrived about 45 minutes after the first calls for help and found more than a dozen people injured, Eric Sherwin, a spokesman for the San Bernardino County Fire Department, said Saturday.

The fire department initially said two people were missing and "presumed submerged."

On Sunday, the sheriff's department said four people, all of whom were traveling on the northbound boat, are missing. The San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department, Arizona DPS Air Rescue and Care Flight all deployed helicopters shortly after the initial call but were unable to locate any of the missing people, according to the Mohave County Sheriff's Department statement.

Nine people were transported to area hospitals by ambulance. Two critically injured people were flown to a hospital in Las Vegas, Schuster said.

The Mohave County and San Bernardino County sheriff's departments are conducting dive and search operations in the area of the crash, which stretches for about two miles officials said.

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