These US Abortion Restrictions Threaten Reproductive Health Everywhere

It’s imperative that advocates not limit their advocacy to the United States but expand it to countries around the world affected by US restrictions.

By Aruna Uprety, Nira Singh Shrestha, Astha Sharma, Giriraj Mani Pokharel and Sumesh Shiwakoty
Septe 23, 2022

The US Supreme Court’s recent decision overturning Roe v. Wade has sparked debate in the United States about how to protect reproductive freedom. President Biden proposed ending the Senate filibuster rule in order for Congress to pass legislation legalizing abortion rights, and he signed an executive order to “protect access to reproductive healthcare services.” In some states, legislators have enacted new laws that expanded abortion rights. However, what is missing in this debate is similar discourse and concrete actions by Democrats to protect reproductive rights not only in the United States but also in less-developed countries, which are directly affected by Republican attacks on US funding for reproductive health around the world.

Continued: https://www.thenation.com/article/world/global-abortion-access-helms-her-act/

Planned Parenthood maps strategy to protect abortion rights

Planned Parenthood leaders from across the country are meeting in California to discuss how to defend abortion rights

By SOPHIE AUSTIN and ADAM BEAM, Associated Press
September 9, 2022

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Planned Parenthood leaders from 24 states gathered in California's capital Friday to begin work on a nationwide strategy to protect and strengthen access to abortion, a counteroffensive aimed at pushing back against restrictions that have emerged in more than half of the country after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

Their goal is to emulate the success liberals have had in California, where state lawmakers passed some of the most robust abortion protections in the country this year, culminating in a statewide election this fall that would make abortion a constitutional right in the nation's most populous state.

continued: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/abortion-leaders-gather-california-talk-strategy-89614443

Biden leans into abortion rights in speech to Democratic activists

The president's remarks about abortion came as he works through refining a midterm stump speech full of increasingly sharp-edged digs at the GOP.

By OLIVIA OLANDER and CHRISTOPHER CADELAGO
Sept 8, 2022

President Joe Biden escalated his attacks on Republicans over abortion rights in a speech to Democratic activists late Thursday, addressing the specifics of what he contends his opponents want: an expansion of abortion bans before many women know they’re pregnant, and an attempt to pass a national ban, which he pledged to veto.

Leaning into the Supreme Court’s overturning of abortion rights this summer, the president suggested there would be a surge of voter activity in the fall midterm elections pushing back against the high court’s decision. Biden reiterated that abortion could be just the start of Republican attempts to dial back rights, including contraception and same-sex marriage.

Continued: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/08/biden-leans-into-abortion-rights-00055819

08.09.2022

Exclusive: New Biden abortion rights push addresses both women and men

By Nandita Bose, Reuters
Aug 16, 2022

Cheered by a decisive win for abortion rights in a Kansas vote and eyeing November midterm elections, the White House is launching a push for abortion access that aims to influence men as well as women, sources with direct knowledge told Reuters.

The Biden administration's three-prong playbook leans on two specific federal statutes to target states that limit abortion, communicates to voters the impact on women, and accentuates how forced pregnancies negatively affect both women and men.

Continued:https://www.reuters.com/world/us/exclusive-white-house-pushes-three-part-plan-abortion-rights-2022-08-16/

16.08.2022

Featured

News

Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act

EMTALA

Institute for National and Global Health Law

Naral Pro-Choice America

United States

Human Rights

Politics

Biden urged to clarify that abortion aid abroad unaffected by Roe v Wade ruling

Senators also seek to correct misinterpretation by aid recipients of Helms amendment as a blanket ban on US funds for abortion

Noa Yachot
Fri 12 Aug 2022

Supporters of reproductive rights in Congress are calling on the government to clarify to foreign aid recipients that the end of abortion rights in the US does not affect US-funded family planning programs abroad, and to limit the damage of a half-century-old law that has functioned as a blanket ban that prevents US aid from supporting abortion care overseas.

Their efforts come as the Biden administration looks for ways to support abortion rights in the wake of the supreme court decision overturning Roe v Wade – which scrapped abortion rights – and amid signs that abortion rights could be a persuasive issue in midterm elections.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/12/foregin-abortion-funding-limit-ban-senators-joe-biden

Biden signs second executive order to protect US abortion access

The directive equips the Heath and Human Services department to expand coverage for patients seeking out of state care

Maanvi Singh
Wed 3 Aug 2022

Joe Biden signed a second executive order on Wednesday that aims to protect access to reproductive healthcare after the US supreme court struck down the constitutional right to abortion.

Most significantly, the order directs the health and human services department to consider ways to expand coverage for patients traveling out of state for reproductive healthcare. Biden’s order does not detail how this could be achieved; currently, government-subsidized Medicaid health insurance plans cover medically necessary abortions in only 16 states and do not reimburse patients who leave their state to seek an abortion.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/03/biden-executive-order-protect-abortion-access

03.08.2022

Featured

News

executive orders to protect abortion

Biden nominates abortion rights lawyer in U.S. Supreme Court case to federal judgeship

July 29, 2022
By Nate Raymond, Reuters

President Joe Biden on Friday nominated a lawyer who represented the Mississippi clinic at the heart of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to overturn its landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion rights decision to become a federal appeals court judge.

Biden's latest slate of nine new judicial nominees included Julie Rikelman, an abortion rights lawyer with the Center for Reproductive Rights whom the president picked to serve on the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Continued: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-nominates-abortion-rights-lawyer-us-supreme-court-case-federal-judgeship-2022-07-29/

29.07.2022

Featured

News

Center for Reproductive Rights

Jackson Women’s Health Organization

An Indiana doctor speaks out on abortion, and pays a price

By Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Ava Sasani
Jul 28, 2022

Three weeks before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an Indianapolis obstetrician-gynecologist, donned her white lab coat, put her infant daughter into a front-pack baby carrier and joined a few colleagues who marched to the state Capitol, hoping to deliver a letter to Gov. Eric Holcomb. Signed by hundreds of health professionals, the letter implored Holcomb, a Republican, not to convene a special legislative session to further restrict abortions. It contained a pointed political message: “Abortion bans are not popular in our state.”

Continued:https://www.chicagotribune.com/nation-world/ct-aud-nw-nyt-indiana-aobrtion-doctor-20220728-uhkntkt5ifgonel3quzllzp6jy-story.html

USA – It’s Time to End My Grandfather’s Harmful Legacy — the Helms Amendment

Biden already has the authority to roll back draconian abortion restrictions.

by ELLEN GADDY
07/28/2022

President Joe Biden and I have met many times throughout my life and over the course of his political career. Our last meeting was in 2008 at the funeral of my grandfather, the late Sen. Jesse Helms of North Carolina.

Biden and my grandfather started their first Senate terms together in 1973, the year Roe v. Wade was decided by the Supreme Court. Although my grandfather was a Republican who opposed civil rights, women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, HIV/AIDS research and abortion, Biden found a way to cross the political divide and work with him on some of these controversial issues, and even helped to soften his views over the years.

Continued: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/07/28/biden-repeal-helms-amendment-on-abortion-00048533