Washington – President Biden and Congress Democrats promise to take steps to protect a woman’s right to abortion after a divided Supreme Court allowed a Texas law outlawing procedures after six weeks of pregnancy to remain in effect in a late-night decision.
The Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, pledged on Thursday that once the House returns to Washington, DC, later this month from its recess, it will pass legislation that enshrines the right to abortion in the federal law and prohibit “medically unnecessary restrictions” on abortion services or facilities. .
“This ban requires coding Roe against Wade,” Pelosi said in a statement condemning the Supreme Court decision. The high court established a woman’s right to abortion in its 1973 decision in Roe.
He broke the court order and said his “cowardly dark night decision to defend a blatantly unconstitutional attack on women’s rights and health is astonishing.”
Presented by California Democrat Congresswoman Judy Chu, the bill could pass the House, but faces an uncertain fate in the Senate, where Democrats have a fragile majority, with Vice President Kamala Harris voting the tiebreaker.
In order for the bill to advance in the uniformly divided Senate, ten Republicans would have to join all Democrats to support it. While some moderate Republicans, such as Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, have said they support abortion rights, it is unclear how many would support efforts to codify Roe’s protection laws. Forty-eight of the 50 Senate Democrats are sponsors of his version of Chu’s bill.
In a 5-4 decision just before midnight, the Supreme Court rejected a request from a group of abortion providers to block Texas ’abortion law, which is the most restrictive in the country.
In addition to banning proceedings in just six weeks, which is before many women know they are pregnant, the measure also authorizes private citizens instead of state officials to file civil lawsuits in state courts against alleged offenders. Among those who can be sued are doctors and staff, as well as anyone who helps a woman get an abortion, such as driving her to a clinic to perform the procedure. If the lawsuit is successful, the plaintiff is entitled to at least $ 10,000 by the offender.
A majority of five judges said his order “is not based on any conclusion about the constitutionality of Texas law,” but Biden warned that its impact “will be immediate and requires an immediate response.”
The president has announced that he is directing his Gender Policy Council and the White House Law Office to “initiate a government-wide effort to respond to this decision, specifically looking at the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice to see what steps the federal government can take to ensure that Texas women have access to legal and safe abortions, as Roe protects, and what legal tools we have to isolate women and providers from impact of Texas’ strange scheme of outsourcing to private parties. “
Attorney General Merrick Garland said the Justice Department “evaluates all options to protect women’s constitutional rights, including access to abortion.” It is unclear what, specifically, the Biden administration can do to protect access to abortion in Texas as long as the law remains in place.
The decision of the high court is a major victory for abortion advocates, who hope that a 6-3 majority of the Supreme Court will pave the way for a number of state-wide abortion restrictions to take effect. Judges will hear a case in the next term which involves a Mississippi law banning abortions after 15 weeks, and Mississippi officials, as well as a number of other Republican-led states, are asking the high court to overrule Roe directly.
But his decision to reject the emergency request from abortion providers and pro-abortion rights groups has also revived two issues that have divided Democrats in Congress: adding seats in the Supreme Court and removing the filibuster legislative, that would allow to advance in bills like the one of Chu. the Senate with a simple majority.
Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, called the Supreme Court’s decision “devastating” and said Congress must act.
“Congress needs to step up now to codify the reproductive rights guaranteed to women by Roe v. Wade – and we can’t let the filibuster get in the way,” she said. he tweeted.
Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York also told the Senate you must not let the filibuster impede legislative efforts to “protect the right to a legal and safe abortion.”
But moderate Senate Democrats, such as Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, are opposed to getting rid of the filibuster.
Progressives, meanwhile, argue that the court’s decision also underscores the need for Congress to pass legislation to expand the high court, which would dilute the power of its conservative majority.
“Talking is cheap. To protect reproductive rights once and for all, we must” add seats in the Supreme Congress, Congressman Mondaire Jones of New York he tweeted. Her call was echoed by other Democrats such as Congresswoman Barbara Lee of California, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Veronica Escobar of Texas.
A group of House Democrats introduced legislation in April to add four seats to the Supreme Court, which increased to 13 judges. Mr. Biden has it commissioned a bipartisan commission with the study of reforms in court, including the addition of seats.