Mike Braun ripped for suggesting states should be allowed to stop interracial marriage

Legal experts were shocked on Tuesday when Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN) argued that states should have the right to ban interracial couples from getting married.

"U.S. Sen. Mike Braun would welcome the U.S. Supreme Court rescinding its 1967 ruling that legalized interracial marriage nationwide in favor of allowing each of the 50 states to decide such issues on their own," The Times of Northwest Indianareported Tuesday. "Speaking Tuesday on a conference call with Indiana reporters, the Hoosier senator unambiguously declared his belief that many of the high court's key civil rights decisions of the past 70 years were wrongly decided and an improper usurpation of state's rights."

Braun argued for "states rights" on Roe v. Wade, which established the right to abortion; Loving v. Virginia, which legalized interracial marriage; and Griswold vs. Connecticut, which established the right to contraceptive use.

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Attorney Bradley Moss described Braun's comments as "letting the mask slip..."

Ben LaBolt, Biden White House advisor for Supreme Court nominations, was surprised by Braun's thinking.

"At this point I have to ask, what are some of these Republican Senators doing??" LaBolt wrote.

Eric Columbus, who was a Judiciary Committee counsel for then-Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), put Braun's comments in the context of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's confirmation.

"Senator Mike Braun says a state should have been allowed to prevent Ketanji Brown Jackson from marrying her husband," Columbus wrote.

Attorney and Vox writer Ian Millhiser imagined the far-right Federalist Society rushing to defend Braun:

Attorney Ken White suggested Braun's comments advance the perspective that "conservatives want to pack the courts to claw back rights established for many decades."

Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ) put Braun's comments in the larger context of things he says "McConnell Republicans" want to ban.

But as LA Times reporter Nolan McCaskill noted, McConnell himself has been in an interracial marriage for decades.

MSNBC's Andrew Joyce wondered McConnell's thoughts on Braun's comments.

Braun is now attempting to walk back his comments, at least as they pertain to Loving v. Virginia.