43rd Anniversary of Roe V. Wade Decision
Floor Speech
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Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, thank you to my colleagues who are joining me here today and so many other efforts to stand up for women. The 43rd anniversary of the Supreme Court's historic ruling in Roe v. Wade is tomorrow. This is an important time to remember how much this decision has meant for women's equality, opportunity, and health, why it is so important we continue defending the hard-won gains that women have made, and why we need to keep pushing for continued progress.
For anyone who supports a woman's constitutionally protected right to make her own health care choices, this has been a tough and trying Congress. To be honest, at the beginning of 2015, I gave my Republican colleagues the benefit of the doubt. I hoped that in the majority, they might focus more on governing and less on trying to get in between a woman and her rights. Unfortunately, that didn't last long.
Since this Congress began, more than 80 bills have been introduced in Congress that would undermine a woman's constitutionally protected right to make her own choices about her own body. The House and Senate have voted a total of 20 times on legislation to roll back women's health and rights.
That is not all. Republicans have pushed budget proposals that would dismantle the Affordable Care Act. After a summer of using deceptive, highly edited videos to discredit Planned Parenthood and try to take away health care services that one in five women rely on over their lifetimes, the House has doubled down by launching a special investigative committee to keep up the political attacks. Of course similar efforts to undermine women's constitutionally protected health care rights are underway across the country.
Nowhere is that clearer than in Texas, where an extreme anti-abortion law could force 75 percent of the clinics statewide to close. If that law stands, 900,000 women of child-bearing age will have to drive as far as 300 miles round trip to get the health care they need.
To be clear, a right means nothing without the ability to exercise that right. Laws like HB2 in Texas and many others like it across the country, driven by extreme conservative efforts to undermine women's access to care, are without question getting in between women and their rights, especially the rights of women who can't afford to take off work and drive hundreds of miles just to get health care.
Later this year, the Supreme Court will decide whether to uphold Texas's extreme anti-abortion law. In doing so, they will decide whether women can act on the rights they are afforded in the Constitution. This law puts women's lives at risk. It is the biggest threat to women's constitutional rights in over a decade. That is why I am working with many of my Democratic colleagues to call on the Supreme Court to uphold Roe v. Wade and protect a woman's right to make her own health care decisions.
Today, as we head into a year that is absolutely critical for women, I have a message for those who want to turn back the clock. Those efforts to undermine women's health care are nothing new. Women have been fighting them for generations, and we are going to keep fighting back today. We are not going to go back to the days when because women had less control over their own bodies, they had less equality and less opportunity.
As we defend the progress we have made, we will keep pushing for more, from continuing to expand access so that where a woman lives doesn't determine what health care she can get to expanding access to affordable birth control and family planning, to fighting back against domestic violence and sexual assault, which disproportionately impacts women.
We are going to keep pushing for progress because we believe strongly that the next generation of women--our daughters and our granddaughters--should have stronger rights and more opportunity, not less.
My colleagues and I in the Senate are going to keep working hard every day to bring women's voices to the Senate floor and show that when women are stronger, our country is stronger. Let's keep up the fight.
As we mark this milestone, the GOP and their extreme allies are doing everything in their power to take away that promise. Since 2010, States have passed 288 new laws that are designed to place barrier upon barrier between women and their critical health care. These laws have piled on outrageous requirements for clinics, providers and the women they serve--making it harder for women to get the care they need.
Texas's extreme law, HB2, is no different. The Supreme Court recently agreed to hear Whole Women's Health v. Cole, a case challenging HB2, which is designed to close health clinics that provide safe, legal abortions. Its proponents claim to be protecting women. In what universe is it ``protecting'' women by making it harder for them to access critical health care?
The answer, of course, is it's not.
This law targets women's health care providers with intentionally burdensome requirements such as mandating that physicians gain admitting privileges at hospitals within a 30-mile radius of where they practice--a provision that has already forced more than half the clinics in Texas to close.
And let's be clear: that is their goal--to shut down clinics and deny rights. If HB2 is upheld, it would reduce the number of providers from 40 to 10. Ten clinics for the second largest State in the country. This would force women to travel for hours or even to another State for care.
That is exactly what happened to Austin resident Marni, who was forced to fly to Seattle when her procedure was cancelled the night before it was scheduled because the clinic was forced to immediately discontinue providing these services after HB2 took effect. Muni said her first reaction was ``to feel like my rights were being taken away from me, to feel very disappointed that elected officials had the ability to make decisions about my and my fiance's life.''
In some cases, forcing women to delay or cancel procedures could endanger their health and lives.
Vikki is a diabetic who discovered months into her pregnancy that the fetus she was carrying suffered from several major anomalies and had no chance of survival. Because of Vikki's diabetes, her doctor determined that induced labor and Caesarian section were both riskier procedures for Vikki than an abortion. Fortunately, Vikki lived in a State where she was able to have the procedure she needed to protect her life and ensure she could have children in the future.
But GOP-led state legislatures are doing everything they can to pass laws designed to deny care to women like Vikki. There are currently laws across the country to: Ban abortions; Restrict the use of the abortion pill; Ban the use of telemedicine--which allows doctors to treat patients who live far away or in rural areas and prescribe abortion medication; Require women to wait a certain time between their first doctor's visit and their procedure; and Require women go through mandatory counseling and even require an ultrasound in which medical personnel describe the image of the fetus to the patient.
This crusade is also about denying access to family planning. Yes, in the year 2016, Republicans and their extreme allies are still on a crusade against contraception, which the Supreme Court deemed legal 50 years ago.
This is despite the fact that we know contraceptives are the best way to decrease unintended pregnancies and abortions.
This is despite the fact that 99 percent of American women who have ever been sexually active have used at least one contraceptive method-- and not just to plan their families. Fifty-eight percent of women who take birth control do so at least in part to treat painful and difficult medical conditions. Of those, 1.5 million women take it solely as a medication to treat those conditions.
They are women like Sandra from Los Angeles, who suffers from polycystic ovary syndrome and has used birth control since the age of 18 to treat her condition, which could otherwise render her infertile and put her at higher risk for complications like heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. For women like Sandra, access to birth control is essential.
In fact, contraception has had such a dramatic impact on women and families in this country that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared it one of the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century. A 2012 study also found that access to affordable birth control led to a decline in teen births and reduced the rate of abortions by one-half, which is a goal we all should share.
So while many of us fight to expand access to affordable birth control, the GOP is trying to make contraception more expensive and harder to get.
Ironically, so many of those who want to overturn Roe and deny access to contraceptives are the same people who say they want limited government. There is nothing limited about inserting the government between a woman, her family and their most personal health care decisions.
This is the opposite of limited government--and it is wrong and dangerous. Leaving women with no other option for health care may force them to take matters into their own hands--and in Texas, it is already happening. A recent study by the University of Texas found that as many as 210,000 women tried to end their own pregnancies since HB2 took effect in 2013.
We cannot go back to the days of back alley abortions.
We cannot undermine the promise Roe made to women 43 years ago.
In the 21st century, we cannot deny women access to family planning and other reproductive care.
But that is exactly what the GOP and their right-wing allies are trying to do.
These shameful attacks are trying to take away the real, legal health care that millions of women depend on. This is a fight that has been picked before. We have won it before, and we will win it again.
We will fight this assault on women's health.
We will fight to make sure that women across America can continue to get the services they need--and deserve.
And, we will make sure the promise of Roe v. Wade is protected for the next generation of women.
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