(FiveNation.com)- More than three months after the Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, President Joe Biden said the White House wasn’t going to “sit by and let Republicans throughout the country enact extreme policies” in regard to reproductive health care.
The president’s comments were made as part of a bigger announcement he made that his administration would take steps to try to enhance protections for women who wanted to get abortion, as it had been 100 days since the Supreme Court’s monumental decision.
During his comments, Biden also specifically attacked the University of Idaho. After the state passed a new law that bans just about all abortions, the school issued guidance saying it shouldn’t offer birth control to any students, and also advised its employees to not speak against abortion while they were at work.
Biden, who was attending the second meeting of his new Task Force on Reproductive Health Care Access, said:
“Folks, what century are we in? What are we doing? I respect everyone’s view on this, personal decisions they make, but my Lord, we’re talking about contraception here. It shouldn’t be that controversial, but this is what it looks like when you start to take away the right of privacy.”
Recently, the Department of Education released new guidance meant for universities that reiterated the requirement under Title IX that all institutions must protect students from any discrimination on the basis of a pregnancy, and that includes any termination of pregnancy.
The Department of Health and Human Services also recently announced new Title X grants that total more than $6 million. They are meant to “protect and expand access to reproductive health care and improve service delivery, promote the adoption of healthy behaviors and reduce existing health disparities.”
All of these moves are meant to build on efforts that were already existing to try to protect reproductive health care federally. Those were the words of Jen Klein, the executive director of the White House Gender Policy Council, who was building on executive actions Biden took earlier in the summer.
The executive order Biden signed in August was an attempt to help women who have to travel out of their home state to get an abortion. It also ensured that all health care providers must comply with federal laws so that women don’t experience delays in getting the health care they need.
And it also sought to advance data college and research on all of these matters.
Biden also took the opportunity at the public portion of the meeting to tell Americans that the only way that the federal right to abortion could be codified into law is if people vote Republicans out of office in the midterm elections next month.
He said:
“The only way it’s going to happen is if the American people can make it happen.”
Klein also used the day as an opportunity to go off on the “extreme steps” Republicans have taken at both the national and state level in regard to abortion. As she commented on what has happened since Roe was overturned:
“The result in that in 100 days, millions of women cannot access critical health care and doctors and nurses are facing criminal penalties for providing health care.”
