US President Joe Biden on Wednesday signed an executive order that seeks to protect the country’s right to abortion, the second of its kind since the Supreme Court’s decision to end the national constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy.
In the order, Biden requests that the federal health department consider allowing Medicaid funds — publicly funded health insurance — to be used to facilitate travel for low-income women who travel to other states for abortions.
Biden asks Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra to consider inviting states to apply for Medicaid exemptions when treating patients who cross state lines to use reproductive health services.
The document, promulgated by the president during the first meeting of an interagency task force on access to reproductive health formed in July, also directs the federal government’s health department to expand access to medical abortion and ensure protection for women traveling to terminate a pregnancy in states where the practice is legal.
The vice president, Kamala Harris, also attended the meeting and showed a map with the differences in access to abortion in the states of the country.
However, like the other executive order on the issue signed by Biden in early July, the new measure is vague about how those goals can be achieved and is expected to have limited impact as Republicans have been promoting a wave of laws restricting abortion, access to medication and funding for such services.
The president’s actions come a day after Kansas voters rejected one such effort to remove abortion protections. The vote was a resounding victory for the right to practice movement in the first statewide election test since the Supreme Court’s decision.
“I don’t think the court has any clue on this matter,” Biden said Wednesday at the task force meeting. “They have no idea about the power of American women. Last night in Kansas they found out.”
He called the Kansas result a “decisive victory” and said voters in the state had sent a “powerful signal” that made it clear that politicians must not interfere with women’s fundamental rights.
Last month, Biden said the Supreme Court, which weighs 6-3 with conservative justices, was “out of control” after ruling in June to overturn Roe v Wade, ending half a century of protections for women’s reproductive rights.
Protecting abortion rights is an important issue for women Democrats, the Reuters poll shows. More than 70% of Americans think the issue should be decided by women and their doctors.
On Tuesday, Biden’s Department of Justice sued the state of Idaho to block a state law that imposes a “near-absolute ban” on abortion, in the government’s first legal challenge to state abortion laws since the Supreme Court’s ruling.
