Scenes from Raleigh’s Bicentennial mall on June 24th:
(Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
President Joe Biden on Friday called for Congress to pass laws protecting abortion rights and for voters to elect pro-rights candidates on “a sad day for the country” after a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling on abortion.
Biden pledged to fight for policies that protect abortion access, including interstate travel and access to federally approved medications. But he said he has limited power to restore the broad protections in place under the 1973 Supreme Court ruling in Roe v. Wade that the court overturned Friday.
Biden called on Congress and voters across the country to exercise their own will.
“This decision must not be the final word,” he said. “My administration will use all of its appropriate lawful powers, but Congress must act. With your vote, you can act. You can have the final word. This is not over.”
‘Roe is on the ballot’
The 6-3 decision Friday marked the first time the court repealed an existing right, and it imperiled those who need access to the procedure, Biden said in a roughly 10-minute speech at the White House.
“With Roe gone, let’s be very clear: The health and life of women in this nation are now at risk,” he said.
Biden urged voters to remember the decision in this fall’s elections, noting that the current Congress appears unwilling to approve abortion rights laws, though several Democrats said Friday they would renew their efforts at federal protections.
“This fall, Roe is on the ballot,” Biden said.
The ruling does not block patients from crossing state lines to seek an abortion or doctors from treating patients from other states. Biden pledged to use the executive branch “to defend that bedrock right.”
“If any state or local official, high or low, tries to interfere with a woman’s exercising her basic right to travel, I will do everything in my power to fight that deeply un-American attack.”
Access to medication
The administration will also seek to maintain access to medications and contraception approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Some state leaders have said they will try to restrict access to medications like mifepristone, a drug the FDA approved in 2000 to end an early pregnancy and is commonly prescribed for miscarriages, Biden said.
Biden directed the Health and Human Services Department to protect access to medications, he said.
The decision’s consequences would start immediately, he said, due to several states’ so-called trigger laws to severely restrict abortion, explicitly written to take effect once Roe was overturned.
The ruling allows “extremist governors and state legislators” to enact abortion restrictions without exception and to criminalize abortion care, Biden said.
The court’s conservative majority showed “how extreme it is, how far removed it is from the majority of this country,” Biden said.
He highlighted a concurring opinion from Justice Clarence Thomas that also threatened court rulings protecting contraception access and same-sex marriage.
“Peaceful, peaceful, peaceful’
With the ruling coming weeks after a man with a gun was arrested outside Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s house and as the U.S. House examines the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol inspired by his predecessor, Biden urged voters unhappy with the ruling to “keep all protests peaceful. Peaceful, peaceful, peaceful.”
Biden closed the speech with an appeal to voters.
“It’s a sad day for the country, in my view, but it doesn’t mean the fight’s over,” he said. “Let me be very clear and unambiguous: The only way we can secure a woman’s right to choose, the balance that existed, is for Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade as federal law. No executive action from the White House can do that.
“And if Congress, as it appears, lacks the votes to do that now, voters need to make their voices heard. This fall, we must elect more senators and representatives who will codify a woman’s right to choose into federal law once again, elect more state leaders to protect this right at the local level.”
Biden would have more to say about the decision “in the weeks to come,” he said.
Image: AdobeStock
WASHINGTON — Congress on Friday cleared the most comprehensive federal gun safety legislation in nearly 30 years, a bipartisan package that will now head to President Joe Biden’s desk for his signature.
In a 65-33 vote, the bill, comprised of eight provisions, passed the U.S. Senate late Thursday. The House on Friday joined, approving the Senate’s bill 234-193, with 14 Republicans joining all Democrats.
“We did something exceptional in the Senate,” Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, the lead negotiator on the gun control legislation, said on Twitter.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said at a press conference ahead of Friday’s vote that while the bill does not have everything that Democrats had hoped for, it’s a start for more gun control.
“Let us not judge the legislation for what it does not do, but for what it does,” she said.
Red flag laws
The bill would provide $750 million for states to enact “red flag laws,” which allow the courts to temporarily remove a firearm from an individual who is a threat to themselves or others, among other provisions.
In a statement, Biden said that he was proud of the legislation Congress passed.
“Kids in schools and communities will be safer because of it,” he said.
Senate Republicans who voted for the bill included Roy Blunt of Missouri, Richard Burr and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Joni Ernst of Iowa, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Rob Portman of Ohio and Patrick Toomey of Pennsylvania.
Senators Thom Tillis and Richard Burr voted for the measure.
Mass shootings
A group of 20 bipartisan senators worked to pass legislation on gun control after the recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York and Uvalde, Texas.
In Buffalo, a White supremacist targeted a Black neighborhood and killed 10 Black people in a grocery store. And in Uvalde, 19 children and two teachers were murdered, making it the second-deadliest mass shooting since the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in 2012.
“Families in Uvalde and Buffalo — and too many tragic shootings before — have demanded action,” Biden said late Thursday. “And tonight, we acted.”
There have been 281 mass shootings this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, an independent data collection organization that defines a mass shooting as one in which four or more people have been shot or killed.
The congressional bill, known as the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, would also provide $11 billion in mental health services for schools and families and curb the illegal trafficking of guns known as straw purchases, in which a buyer can acquire a gun for someone else.
Rep. Lucy McBath, Georgia Democrat and gun safety advocate, said that the passage of this bill is just the beginning of Congress’ fight for gun safety. Her son, Jordan, was murdered, and McBath has championed red flag laws.
“This gives us hope,” she said of the bill. “This bill does not answer all of our prayers, but this is hope.”
The last time Congress passed major gun legislation was in 1994, when then-President Bill Clinton signed a ban on assault weapons that spanned 10 years. The ban was not renewed when it expired.
Court decision
The passage of the bill also follows a recent Supreme Court decision that went in the opposite direction, striking down a concealed carry law in New York and expanding Second Amendment rights.
A major sticking point as lawmakers debated the Senate bill was the closing of the “boyfriend” loophole. The legislation includes a five-year period during which those who are convicted of committing an assault against a romantic partner must wait to obtain a firearm. If no other offenses are committed, then that person will be removed from the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
Sen. Martin Heinrich, a New Mexico Democrat, said on the Senate floor Thursday said that his sons have to routinely practice school shooter drills.
“That type of experience has become all too common in our country,” he said. “It’s appalling and it’s unacceptable.”
Heinrich, who added that he is a gun owner himself, said that commonsense gun laws will help curb gun violence not only in his own state, but also across the country.
The bill would also require those under 21 who want to purchase a firearm to undergo a background check that takes into account a review of juvenile and mental health records.
Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a Michigan Democrat, and part of the bipartisan group, said that the provision on red flag laws will give family members a tool to temporary remove a weapon from someone who could harm themselves. Stabenow said that the red flag laws and mental health provisions will help save lives, as a large portion of firearm deaths are due to suicide.
“It really is transformative,” Stabenow said of the funding for mental health services.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican who backed the measure, said on the Senate floor Thursday that he felt the bill “makes our country safer without making it any less free.”
Blunt, a member of the bipartisan group, said that the one thing these “mass shootings have in common is a perpetrator that has mental health problems.”
He reiterated that those with mental health problems are not dangerous.
“Mental health is a health issue, and we should treat it as a health issue,” he said.
Blunt said the mental health funding that the bill provides will help those who are in crisis and could potentially harm themselves or others.
Sen. John Hickenlooper said on the Senate floor that mass shootings have become a uniquely American experience, growing since the Columbine school shooting in his state in 1999.
He said a movie theater shooting in 2012 in Aurora, Colorado, where he visited the scene as governor, “still haunts me.”
The nine Senate Democrats and one independent in the bipartisan group that came up with the bill are Murphy, Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Cory Booker of New Jersey, Chris Coons of Delaware, Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, Mark Kelly of Arizona, Angus King of Maine, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan.
The 10 Senate Republicans in the bipartisan group are John Cornyn of Texas, Tillis, Blunt, Burr, Cassidy, Collins, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Portman, Mitt Romney of Utah and Toomey.
Image: AdobeStock
Republicans in Congress were jubilant at the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling overturning decades of precedent to revoke a constitutional right to an abortion, while Democrats were equally despondent about what they called an extremist decision that revoked a long-held right and represented an attack on women’s autonomy.
The party-line reaction hints at how lawmakers will approach abortion as the issue moves away from the court and more directly to the elected branches of government.
Democrats urged that voters remember the ruling when they go to the polls in the November mid-term elections and said they will redouble their attempts to pass legislation protecting the right to an abortion that’s stalled in the evenly divided U.S. Senate.
Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who backs abortion rights, said she voted to confirm Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch, and their agreement with the majority 6-3 decision was “inconsistent” with what they said during their hearings and in conversations with her. “The court “abandoned a fifty-year precedent at a time that the country is desperate for stability,” Collins said in a statement.
The leaders of the House Pro-Choice Caucus, Democrats Diana DeGette of Colorado and Barbara Lee of California, said in a statement the ruling would force women in half the states to “face a terrifying legal landscape when trying to access the abortion care they need.”
“We cannot overstate the devastating impact that this horrific decision will have on millions of people across this country,” they said. “By disregarding fifty years of legal precedent, the U.S. Supreme Court has effectively stripped away from 36 million women the freedom to control their own bodies and have handed that power, instead, to the politicians in their states.”
The decision would “undoubtedly put the health and economic futures of millions of women at risk,” they said. They pledged to renew efforts to enshrine legal protections to abortion in legislation.
President Joe Biden said the ruling broke new ground for the court in revoking an existing right and would have immediate impact in states with more restrictive laws than Roe would have permitted.
“The court has done what it has never done before: Expressly take away a constitutional right that is so fundamental to so many Americans.”
McConnell compares to segregation decision
Celebrating the ruling, Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell compared it to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision that invalidated legal school segregation. Like the Friday ruling, the Brown decision also overturned a previous Supreme Court case.
“The Court has corrected a terrible legal and moral error, like when Brown v. Board overruled Plessy v. Ferguson,” McConnell said in a statement.
Statements from some Republican lawmakers recognized the ruling as the culmination of decades of activism aimed at overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.
“Millions of Americans have spent half a century praying, marching, and working toward today’s historic victories for the rule of law and for innocent life,” McConnell said. “I have been proud to stand with them throughout our long journey and I share their joy today.”
“I’ve waited 49 years for it and the wait is OVER!!!” Louisiana U.S. Rep. Billy Long wrote on Twitter. “#SCOTUS overturns #RoeVsWade, potentially saving millions of innocent lives!!!”
Several Republican members of Congress tweeted simply, “Life wins.”
Members posting that message or a version of it included Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Jim Jordan and Mike Carey of Ohio, Minority Whip Steve Scalise of Louisiana, Jody Hice and Buddy Carter of Georgia, Yvette Herrell of New Mexico, Diana Harshbarger of Tennessee, Kat Cammack of Florida, Lisa McClain of Michigan and the House Republican Conference account.
President Joe Biden is scheduled to speak about the decision Friday afternoon.
Women in Congress
The leaders of the Democratic Women’s Caucus in the House, including Co-Chairs Lois Frankel of Florida, Brenda Lawrence of Michigan, Jackie Speier of California and Whip Nikema Williams of Georgia, said the ruling would “go down in history as one of (the court’s) worst, most unjust decisions.”
“Women are not chattel, and the government should not have the right to mandate pregnancies,” they said in a statement. “Every situation and pregnancy is different, and all people deserve the freedom to control their bodies and make personal decisions about their lives and futures. We will never give up the fight for access to full health care.”
In her own tweet, Williams noted her decade-long employment with Planned Parenthood before coming to Congress that gave her a closer look at the consequences of restricting abortion access.
“I’ve seen the pain and devastation that comes when states eliminate equal access to legal, safe abortions,” she said. “The Supreme Court’s radical majority hasn’t just opened the door to that, it’s welcoming it with open arms.”
Schumer blames Senate GOP
Several Democrats blamed Senate Republicans for the Supreme Court’s conservative makeup and called for action in the chamber to protect abortion rights on the federal level.
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement the ruling made Friday “one of the darkest days our country has ever seen” and called Senate Republicans “complicit in today’s decision and all of its consequences for women and families.”
Schumer urged voters to remember the court’s decision in November.
“Today’s decision makes crystal clear the contrast as we approach the November elections,” the New York Democrat said in a statement.
“Elect more MAGA Republicans if you want nationwide abortion bans, the jailing of women and doctors and no exemptions for rape or incest. Or, elect more pro-choice Democrats to save Roe and protect a woman’s right to make their own decisions about their body, not politicians.”’
Biden also called for Congress to act and for voters to choose candidates in November who support abortion rights.
Ohio’s Tim Ryan, a Democratic House member running for the Senate, sought campaign contributions immediately after the ruling was released.
“I proudly voted for the Women’s Health Protection Act in the House, only to watch it die in the Senate,” he wrote on Twitter. “It’s clear the Senate is not working and women will pay the price unless we act. Make a donation to help us defeat my anti-choice opponent, JD Vance.”
Senate Judiciary ranking Republican Chuck Grassley of Iowa celebrated the ruling, which he said protected “the rights of the unborn.” The ruling was well-reasoned in its overturning of judicial precedent — an action the high court has taken before, he noted.
“For many Americans, including myself, this decision is about far more than correcting a flawed legal analysis in Roe,” he said in a written statement. “It means that the rights of the unborn are no longer in jeopardy by our federal government. Our nation was founded on the fundamental principle we are endowed by our creator with the unalienable right to life — a right that must be protected.
“This ruling does not ban the practice of abortion but instead empowers the people, through their accountable elected representatives to make commonsense policy decisions. It takes policymaking out of the hands of unelected judges.”
Former Vice President Mike Pence, a longtime champion of the religious right, called for state abortion bans in every state.
“Having been given this second chance for Life, we must not rest and must not relent until the sanctity of life is restored to the center of American law in every state in the land,” he posted on Twitter.
Manchin, Collins blast Trump justices
But the court’s move Friday to directly contradict established precedent — especially by justices who’d explicitly identified Roe as settled during their confirmation hearings — opened it to criticism.
Even the most conservative member of Schumer’s caucus, West Virginia’s Joe Manchin III, said Friday he was “deeply disappointed” in the ruling.
Manchin, who considers himself pro-life and voted for two of former President Donald Trump’s nominees to the court, criticized those justices Friday for breaking with what they’d said in confirmation hearings.
“I trusted Justice (Neil) Gorsuch and Justice (Brett) Kavanaugh when they testified under oath that they also believed Roe v. Wade was settled legal precedent and I am alarmed they chose to reject the stability the ruling has provided for two generations of Americans,” Manchin said in a written statement.
Collins expressed displeasure with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh in a statement that slammed the decision for casting abortion policy into upheaval.
“This ill-considered action will further divide the country at a moment when, more than ever in modern times, we need the Court to show both consistency and restraint. Throwing out a precedent overnight that the country has relied upon for half a century is not conservative. It is a sudden and radical jolt to the country that will lead to political chaos, anger, and a further loss of confidence in our government.
“This decision is inconsistent with what Justices Gorsuch and Kavanaugh said in their testimony and their meetings with me, where they both were insistent on the importance of supporting long-standing precedents that the country has relied upon.”
Manchin and fellow “pro-life Democrat” Sen. Bob Casey Jr. of Pennsylvania blasted the decision for overturning established law.
“Today’s decision upends almost a half century of legal precedent and rips away a constitutional right that generations of women have known their entire lives,” Casey, whose father, as the commonwealth’s governor, challenged Roe in another of the cases the court overturned Friday, tweeted.
“This dangerous ruling won’t end abortions in this country, but it will put women’s lives at risk,” he added.
Senate fight to come?
With abortion rights no longer guaranteed by the judicial branch, many Democrats on Friday appealed for passage of legislation to protect abortion rights, including a House-passed measure that has stalled under the Senate’s 60-vote threshold.
“The Senate must pass the Women’s Health Protection Act,” U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said in a statement. “Republican obstruction and abuse of the filibuster is not an acceptable excuse for inaction when the fundamental rights of millions hang in the balance.”
Collins’ statement promoted her own bill with Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski that she said would codify the protections in Roe. She was also working with Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine on a bipartisan bill, she said.
Abortion rights should be consistent nationally, Collins said, though states should be allowed to make minor policy adjustments.
“Our goal with this legislation is to do what the Court should have done — provide the consistency in our abortion laws that Americans have relied upon for 50 years,” she said.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, promised the panel would hold a hearing next month to explore the “grim reality” of the decision’s consequences.
“I will keep fighting to enshrine into law a woman’s right to make her own reproductive choices,” Durbin said. “We cannot let our children inherit a nation that is less free and more dangerous than the one their parents grew up in.”
Durbin spoke with Vice President Kamala Harris about the ruling as the two traveled on Air Force Two Friday morning, according to a pool report.
Ariana Figueroa contributed to this report.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday overturned the 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade ruling, which established abortion as a constitutional right. The following is reaction to the ruling from a number of prominent North Carolinians:
From state House Rep. Julie von Haefen:
ICYMI: NC House Speaker Tim Moore made his intentions crystal clear yesterday. “North Carolinians should fully expect that when we’re in session next year, that we deal with this and that we enhance those protections for the unborn.”
This is an all-hands-on-deck situation. Vote.
— Rep. Julie von Haefen ???? (@juliefornc) June 25, 2022
From state Senator Natalie Murdock:
Roe has been overturned, what happens next in NC? #RoeOverturned #SCOTUS pic.twitter.com/8YjU5AeY2n
— Senator Natalie Murdock (@NatalieforNC) June 25, 2022
From Congresswoman Alma Adams (NC-12):
From Congresswoman Deborah Ross (NC-02):
Rep. Deborah Ross
“The bottom line is this: women will lose control over all aspects of their lives because of this decision.“The Supreme Court has done what many believed was unthinkable for nearly half a century. By overturning Roe v. Wade, they have stripped millions of women of a sacred constitutional right. And they did so even though the vast majority of Americans agree that women should have the right to make their own reproductive healthcare decisions. I fear for all our sisters and daughters and I fear for the state of North Carolina, where we will need to fight tooth and nail in the coming weeks and months to preserve access to abortion healthcare.“The people of North Carolina elected me to stand up for them, and I will not give up. I will not back down. I will join with people across our state from both political parties and from every walk of life. Together, we will keep fighting every day until all women have control over their own reproductive decisions.”
From US. Senate candidate and for NC Supreme Court Chief Justice Cheri Beasley:
The Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and decimate abortion access sets a dangerous legal precedent for our personal freedoms.
As the former Chief Justice of the NC Supreme Court, I know reproductive freedom is a constitutional right.
— Cheri Beasley (@CheriBeasleyNC) June 24, 2022
From state Senator Natasha Marcus:
“This is outrageous. The US Supreme Court has released a torrent of disrespectful rhetoric and a dangerous injustice with its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health today. Any American who might become pregnant, or anyone who cares about someone who could, should be very angry and very worried. The Court has taken the alarming step of overturning precedents that have been in place for my entire lifetime in order to rip away women’s rights to maintain basic autonomy over our bodies. The Dobbs decision has given a green light to forced births, maternal hardships, and rapists having more rights than the women they forcibly impregnate.
It is hard to believe that this is America in 2022. Women and girls in many states will immediately become second-class citizens, without the right to make decisions for themselves about whether and when to have a child. Women and girls in many other states, like North Carolina, won’t immediately lose their rights, but are now one bad election cycle away from losing them. Instead of being the land of the free where all people are guaranteed liberty, America will now be a disturbing patchwork where women in some states are forced to continue unexpected, unviable, unsafe and/or unwanted pregnancies, while other states become crowded safe havens for abortion care refugees forced to flee in order to access the care they need. People, many of whom are already mothers, will die and suffer harm because of this terrible, unjust ruling by an activist Supreme Court.
As a member of the North Carolina General Assembly, I call on legislative leaders to pass my bill, SB888, Codify Roe and Casey, to maintain the status quo on abortion access in North Carolina and make sure that North Carolinians can continue to access the reproductive healthcare that we need. For now, abortion is still legal in North Carolina. We cannot slide backwards or allow the government to block people from making our own decisions about such deeply personal matters.”
From Buncombe County Commissioner and NC-11 congressional candidate Jasmine Beach-Ferrara:
I can't stop thinking about how so many of us have relied on the courts to protect our constitutional rights, and how those rights are under threat. We cannot go backwards. Every race on the ballot matters more than ever now. [2/2]
— Jasmine Beach-Ferrara (@JBeachFerrara) June 24, 2022
From NC Attorney General Josh Stein:
This is true even after the Supreme Court today stripped women of their right to an abortion under the Constitution by overturning Roe v. Wade. If we want to keep our freedoms under state law, then we have to elect state officials who commit to protecting them. 2/2
— Josh Stein (@JoshStein_) June 24, 2022
From Governor Roy Cooper:
“For 50 years, women have relied on their constitutional right to make their own medical decisions, but today that right has been tragically ripped away. That means it’s now up to the states to determine whether women get reproductive health care, and in North Carolina they still can. I will continue to trust women to make their own medical decisions as we fight to keep politicians out of the doctor’s exam room.”
From Congressman G.K. Butterfield:
Today is a sad day in American jurisprudence.
— G. K. Butterfield (@GKButterfield) June 24, 2022
From Anu Kumar, President and CEO of @IpasOrg
My daughter now has fewer rights than me or her grandmother #DobbsvJackson
— Anu Kumar (@AnuKumarIpas) June 24, 2022
