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Floor Speech

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Ms. SMITH. I thank Senator Baldwin for her thoughtful remarks.

Mr. President, I rise today in support of the Women's Health Protection Act, and I urge my colleagues to join us in standing up for fundamental rights to freedom, autonomy, and self-determination.

Make no mistake: That is what this vote is about--who has the power; who has the freedom to decide when your own health, livelihood, and life are on the line.

There is nothing more American than the values of freedom and individual autonomy; yet the U.S. Supreme Court is about to declare that women in this country are not guaranteed the freedom to make their own private decisions about abortion.

Justice Alito, Mitch McConnell, Senate Republicans, and radical Republican State legislators around the country believe that they should have the power--that they know better than American women, whose lives and stories they will never know.

To that, I say: How dare they?

When I worked at Planned Parenthood, I saw firsthand the capacity of women to make good decisions about their health, their bodies, and their lives. To suggest otherwise is insulting to the dignity of women as full, adult human beings and as equal citizens of this Nation, but that is where we are. Justice Alito's draft opinion is a wake-up call and a call to action. Reading his opinion was like a gut punch, but it was not a surprise, and it didn't just happen.

This is the result of a decades' long campaign by Republicans and their dark money donors to put anti-choice Justices on the Supreme Court, to overturn Roe, and to strip women of their constitutional rights. This is why this vote is so important. For the first time in my living memory, the Supreme Court is about to take away a fundamental constitutional right, and it is important that Americans see who is on their side and who is responsible for this.

Extremist Republicans have been working for this goal for decades; yet, now that this moment is almost here, they keep trying to change the subject. In fact, they want to talk about anything but, including when they spread misleading information about what the Women's Health Protection Act would really do, which is to put the protections of Roe into statute.

So why are Republicans running from this issue after having campaigned on it for years?

Well, it is because Americans don't want to overturn Roe, and anti- choice Republicans know this. They know that they are on the wrong side of history and on the wrong side of public opinion and of over half the American electorate. That is why this vote is so important. We will not let them dodge their responsibility for this outrageous attack on women's freedom.

Now, some Republicans are saying that this is all a bit of a tempest in a teapot. They say: Don't worry. All the Supreme Court is about to do is to hand power back for the States to decide on abortion.

Colleagues, do not believe this. The American people deserve to know where this goes next.

Today, we are fighting on the Senate floor to preserve in law the basic protections of Roe v. Wade, but extremist Republicans have been clear. Their end goal is to secure a nationwide ban on abortion. As Senator McConnell said this weekend: It is not a secret that the Senate Republican caucus is opposed to reproductive rights and that, if Senate Republicans win the majority, a nationwide ban is ``worthy of debate.''

That is the post-Roe future if Republicans are in charge.

Even though a majority of Americans in all States believes that abortion should be legal, Republicans have been clear that a nationwide ban is their goal. At the same time, Republican State legislators are brazenly moving forward. They are moving forward with extremist policies that go way beyond depriving women of their essential freedoms--they punish and criminalize women.

Take, for example, a Missouri mother of two, facing a high-risk pregnancy, who travels to Illinois for an abortion because she is worried about being there for her existing children. Missouri Republicans want her to be labeled as a felon when she returns homes.

Take a woman in Louisiana who has an abortion after her IUD failed and she had an unexpected pregnancy. Louisiana Republicans want her convicted of homicide.

Take the Texas woman, who hoped and prayed for years for a baby, only to have her doctor find a fatal fetal anomaly at 22 weeks. Texas Republicans want her to carry that pregnancy for another 18 weeks, no matter the risk to her life and no matter the trauma she faces as people congratulate her on her upcoming baby when she knows she will never know that child.

So I say again, how dare these Republicans think that they know better than the women who live these stories.

This is the post-Roe world that Republicans want, and we won't stand for it. If you think this struggle doesn't affect you or someone you care about, think again.

One in four American women will have an abortion--women who are Democrats, Republicans, Independents, women from all places and all religious faiths. For these women, abortion isn't about politics; it is about healthcare. Most of them never expected to be part of this statistic, but life doesn't always go as we plan. Every day, women deal with situations they never imagined, and they deserve the freedom and the autonomy to decide for themselves what to do and what is best for them.

With this vote to pass the Women's Health Protection Act, we are showing whom we stand with and what we believe--the fundamental freedom of people to make the best decisions for their health, their families, and their futures.

Thank you.

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