Chief Justice determines who gets to author the majority opinion, so the CJ tends to make sure he's in the majority opinion. Consider this: Roberts did not join in the majority and this was going to be or is a 5-4 ruling (Alito, Thomas, Barrett, Kavanuagh, Gorsuch vs. Roberts, Breyer, Kagan, Sotomayor). Then as senior Justice, Thomas chooses majority opinion writer. He'd choose Alito, obviously. Now that Alito's absolutely nuke of an opinion is out there, perhaps Roberts changes his mind to side with the majority so he could choose himself to write the majority opinion and try to make it far less of a nuke to Roe? He'll try to side with Mississippi but not outright overturn Roe let alone declare that there is no constitutional right of abortion, unlike Alito who demolished all of that bullshit.

Could this have all been a trap to expose Roberts? 🤔

And consider this, perhaps the Court is utterly compromised and the "majority" was not going to uphold the MS law, let alone overturn Roe and declare that there is no 14th Amendment abortion constitutional right? Perhaps only Alito and Thomas are clean? Perhaps they leaked this opinion to show the TRUTH that was going to be suppressed? Perhaps this is a warning to the other "conservative" Justices, that if they somehow changed their votes, if they won't agree with Alito, then it's a bullet to the head for them? 🤔