House Democrats are promising that abortion protections will be among their first acts next year if voters return them to power in the November elections.
Lawmakers warn that keeping the Republican Party in control of the House of Representatives — especially if Republicans take control of the Senate and the White House — would lead to tougher restrictions not only on abortions, but also on contraception, in vitro fertilization (IVF) and stem cell research.
Their plan is to quickly pass legislation protecting women from these restrictions, even in conservative states where lawmakers have passed them into law.
“House Democrats unequivocally believe in women's freedom to make their own reproductive health care decisions – period, period,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) , during a reproductive health care rally at the Capitol on Thursday.
“It is a decision that must be made between a woman, her family, her faith and her doctors. The far right's extreme efforts to take away reproductive freedom are unacceptable, unconscionable and un-American. We must stop them; and together we will stop them.”
Jeffries said that if Democrats return to power next year, they would pass several proposals to protect abortion rights, access to contraception and the use of IVF procedures across the country.
Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.) is the sponsor of one of those bills: the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would restore the constitutional right to abortion, which was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2022. Her legislation would protect patients and health care providers from criminal prosecution, even in states where the procedure is effectively banned.
'For the first time in American history, young women have fewer rights than their grandmothers. But it doesn't have to be that way,” Chu said. “I know that when we take back the House of Representatives, when we keep the Senate, and when we re-elect President Biden, this will be the first bill that will pass from the floor and from Congress.”
The comments came in a week in which Democrats are highlighting the two-year anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case that established access to abortion as a constitutional right.
In the wake of that decision, Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, more than two dozen states passed new laws banning or placing strict restrictions on the procedure. Supporters of these laws say they protect the sanctity of life. Yet the restrictions have led to cases where doctors, fearing criminal consequences, have refused to perform abortions even when they believed the mother's life was in danger.
“Now more than ever, the public is experiencing the tragic consequences of allowing politicians to dictate what medical care women can and cannot receive,” Rep. Suzan DelBene (Wash.), head of the Democrats' campaign arm, said this week.
The issue has been a top issue for Democrats since the Supreme Court's decision, as voters in states across the country — including Republican strongholds like Kansas, Kentucky and Ohio — have passed measures to protect access to abortion care. Democrats are also encouraged by polls that routinely show most voters oppose abortion restrictions, especially when the mother's health is at risk.
The Biden administration has seized on the unpopularity of these restrictions to attack former President Trump, whose appointment of three conservative Supreme Court justices paved the way for the decision to repeal Roe — an issue that is sure to figure prominently in Thursday evening's presidential debate.
Trump, in turn, carefully sidesteps the issue, embracing his role in overturning Roe while refusing to endorse a federal abortion ban favored by many of his conservative supporters. That was the message Trump delivered to Republicans in the House of Representatives during a private meeting on Capitol Hill earlier this month.
“He still believes that the Dobbs decision was the right decision for America, and that the American people should decide the issue as they are doing now,” Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.) said afterward. It could be a time and place for the federal government to get involved. But what needs to happen now are the votes of the people in the states.”
With the House of Representatives up for grabs in November, House Democrats are also highlighting the issue, hoping it will sway voters at the ballot box.
Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), co-chair of the House Pro-Choice Caucus, noted Thursday that a large majority of the House GOP conference has approved legislation that would establish personhood at conception — a concept that would effectively ban abortion, IVF procedures, many forms of contraception and stem cell research.
“They don't really want to talk about it right now because they realize that the vast majority of Americans, and the vast majority of their voters, are against these extreme laws,” DeGette said. “But make no mistake: if they keep the House of Representatives, if they take over the Senate, and if Donald Trump wins the White House, this is exactly the far-right majority that will pass these laws.
“We just can't let this happen.”
