President Joe Biden signed this Friday (8) a decree that provides for the creation of new measures to facilitate women’s access to abortion and protect them from punishment. The package of actions includes support for women’s clinics, expansion of access to medicines and protection of personal data for those seeking the procedure.
Before signing the executive order, the president attacked the Supreme Court’s decision. “This was not a decision guided by the Constitution. It was an exercise of pure political power,” he said. He pointed out that several laws defend women’s right to health care and privacy, but that this was not considered by the judges.
The president also criticized the states. “Last week it was reported that a 10-year-old girl, a victim of rape, was forced to travel to another state to terminate her pregnancy and perhaps save her life. Does anyone believe that a 10-year-old girl should be forced to have a child of a rapist? I can’t think of anything as extreme as that,” he said, in an angry tone.
The announcement comes two weeks after the Supreme Court struck down the constitutional right to abortion, which allows states to ban or curtail legal access to the practice. The country is heading towards a divisive scenario, in which abortion must be banned in about half of the states and allowed in the other half.
This Friday’s decree determines a series of actions to be taken, but the implementation will still be defined by federal agencies. The order requires the Secretary of Health to prepare, within 30 days, a report on how the proposals can be put into practice and that a task force involving various government agencies be created.
Among the actions is to expand women’s access to abortifacient medicines, which are authorized for use in the US, as well as morning-after pills and contraceptives. There will also be an additional $3 million in funding for gynecological and family planning clinics, to be used for training and technical assistance.
The government also intends to expand education and communication campaigns to inform women about their right to access these medicines and treatments.
The White House also wants to encourage the voluntary work of lawyers and legal entities that want to defend the right of women to travel to another state to obtain an abortion, in order to protect them against lawsuits that may arise at state levels. Some states are debating laws to punish residents who travel for abortions in other parts of the country where the procedure is still allowed.
Biden wants to strengthen protections over personal data held by tech companies to prevent that information from being used against women seeking abortion-related information or services. The idea is to create new procedures for managing this data, so that doctors, hospitals and health operators have to keep the information confidential. In many cases, including the police.
The effectiveness of the actions, however, is still uncertain. There are states that have banned, or intend to ban, the use of abortion pills and even their mailing. Despite being a drug released by federal health authorities, there is no national law that guarantees access to them.
Biden is not empowered to create an executive order that would legalize abortion nationwide. A movement of this magnitude would only take place with the approval of Congress. Currently, Republicans have the power to contain such a measure, through the filibuster, a mechanism that allows the minority party to bar proposals.
The president has called for Democratic lawmakers to change the filibuster rules to pass a pro-abortion law in the country, but some party senators are against it. The fear is that the change will harm Democrats in the future if they lose the majority they have today.
There will be legislative elections in November, and projections show that there is a good chance of a Republican victory. An analysis by the website FiveThirtyEight, which specializes in statistics, points out that the opposition has an 87% chance of taking control of the House, and 55% of doing the same in the Senate.
Biden and other Democratic leaders have argued that the best way to fight for the return of abortion rights is to vote, in the November elections, for candidates who defend that banner. However, dissatisfaction with the current government may lead more people to vote for the opposition: the president’s approval is around 38%, the lowest level since the beginning of the government.
