Washington Wednesday - The White House war with pro-life states

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s Wednesday the 13th of July, 2022.

This is The World and Everything in It and we’re so glad you’ve joined us today. Good morning, I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Today is Washington Wednesday, and up first: the White House war with pro-life states.

President Biden came under much criticism from pro-abortion activists. They said he wasn’t doing enough to protect abortion access. Last week, though, the president signed an executive order on abortion.

REICHARD: Biden said he’s directing federal agencies to take multiple steps to maintain access to abortions. Much more on that in a moment.

Additionally, the president is even considering declaring a public-health emergency over abortion access.

BIDEN: That’s something I’ve asked the folks, the medical people in the administration to look at, whether I had the authority to do that and what impact that would have.

That could allow his administration to use taxpayer dollars.

EICHER: He’s also calling on Congress to pass a bill that would codify abortion rights into federal law.

Democrats have congressional majorities theoretically to make that happen, but one procedural hurdle stands in the way: a Senate rule called the filibuster. Overcoming a filibuster requires 60 votes. But getting rid of the rule requires only a majority vote…

That is something some senators are loath to do on the grounds that what goes around comes around—especially in politics.

Well, joining us now to help us understand what all of this might mean is Jamie Dangers. She is Legislative Director for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.

REICHARD: Jamie, good morning!

JAMIE DANGERS, GUEST: Good morning, Mary. Thanks so much for having me.

REICHARD: Let’s start with the president’s executive order. The order directs federal agencies to fight any state efforts that it says tries to limit a woman’s ability to cross state lines to get an abortion. What is this order really about and what will it actually do?

DANGERS: Yeah, there's a lot of fear mongering going on. And there's a lot in this executive order that points to problems that don't actually exist. For example, no one is actually trying to stop a woman's travel movements. And in some ways, this order sounds like it's very egregious and showing how far the President is willing to go and what he is trying to do. But when you look at what it actually accomplishes, really, he's just telling departments like Health and Human Services to make a plan to do something. So there isn't so much of an immediate effect, but more of an outline of what he is trying to accomplish through the executive branch. And I think to me, one of the really ludicrous parts about the executive order is that the president directs the Department of Health and Human Services to launch outreach and public education efforts so that Americans can know where to go to get abortions. So essentially, he's directing HHS to become the marketing arm of the abortion industry.

REICHARD: The executive order also seeks to ensure access to abortifacient drugs. How so?

DANGERS: Yeah, so they're talking about the chemical abortion drugs that the Food and Drug Administration, the FDA, has approved, but they approved it under a safety protocol called the REMS—the risk evaluation and mitigation strategy—because they know that those drugs are actually dangerous, or can be dangerous to the women and girls who take them. So what the administration has been doing already, even before this executive order, is working with the Food and Drug Administration to weaken the safety protocols by allowing these drugs to be available through the mail so that a woman or a girl doesn't have to go in and see her doctor to get screened, which is very dangerous because no one is checking to see if she has an ectopic pregnancy or even how far along she is. Maybe she's got her dates wrong. And they're known to be dangerous drugs. So, several states have already passed laws to strengthen the safety protocols, to make sure that in their state these drugs cannot be made available through the mail. And what Biden is trying to do is preempt some of those life-saving protections that some of the pro-life states have already enacted or are working to do.

REICHARD: Okay, let’s talk now about Biden thinking he’ll declare a public health emergency over abortion access. Can he legally do this? And if so, what would it mean?

DANGERS: Yeah, so public health emergencies are a legitimate thing. But COVID-19 pandemic was a recent example. And, you know, it required the various executive agencies, federal government, state, local, tribal governments to coordinate efforts to try to manage and mitigate what was an emergency. But public health emergencies should be for actual public health emergencies. And again, this is part of the abortion lobby’s fear mongering tactics to try to create a sense of panic when really there is no need for that. It's abortion that has always been dangerous.

They’re pushing dangerous drugs. They're pushing deregulation. They're pushing dangerous abortions. And saying those who are trying to protect the unborn and protect their moms are creating a public health emergency. It makes no sense.

REICHARD: Back to President Biden’s calling on Congress to pass a national abortion access law by any means necessary, even if that means using the “nuclear option” to end the filibuster. But right now, Democrats lack the votes needed to make that happen, correct?

DANGERS: Yes, thankfully. So currently, Senate rules are that if they're working to pass legislation, the first step is the cloture vote or what is known as the filibuster, and that is a 60 vote threshold. And that's hard to reach unless it's a truly bipartisan initiative.

Also, Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who are both Democrats, are very vocally opposed to ending the filibuster for various reasons. And while Senator Sinema is not a pro-life voter, she's always voted against pro-life bills in the Senate, Senator Manchin often votes pro-life, but both of them still want to protect the filibuster. So that's good news. But also it's interesting because the bill that President Biden is pushing—deceptively called the Women's Health Protection Act and what we around here call the Abortion on Demand Until Birth Act—is actually one that Democrats haven't even been able to get a majority at all, even a simple majority on. They've already voted on it twice and most recently, they had more NO votes than YES votes. So even if the filibuster didn't hold for some reason, they still couldn't get it through this Senate.

REICHARD: Some Democratic lawmakers have proposed establishing abortion facilities on federal lands in pro-life states. Even national parks. Is that likely to happen?

DANGERS: You know, this is something they've been kind of bandying about ever since Texas enacted its heartbeat law in September of last year. But so far, no one has been able to figure out how to do it lawfully, which is great news. There are really good laws on the books preventing federal funds from being used in certain ways having to do with abortion. And the pro-life members of Congress and pro-abortion members of Congress are both studying this right now to try to figure out how strong those protections are and are they enough. We think they are. But we are working to ensure that is the case. However, there are efforts to legislatively make it possible for the federal government to use federal lands in pro-life states. For example, Congresswoman Jayapal of Washington, she leads the Progressive Caucus here in Congress. She has an amendment right now that she's trying to get passed that would allow abortions to happen on military bases using money from the Department of Defense. And both of those things—on military bases and with Department of Defense funds—are prohibited by law. So that's an uphill climb for her, but it's something they're trying. I just don't think Americans—I mean, so far, Biden and members of Congress and those in the executive branch have been stymied in their efforts to do this, but also Americans just don't like the idea of their national parks being used for abortion facilities. I mean, can you imagine an abortion facility right next to Old Faithful? It blows the mind that they would try to get around pro-life state laws by doing something so extreme.

REICHARD: We’ve been talking to Jamie Dangers with Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. Jamie, a real pleasure to talk with you.

DANGERS: Thank you, Mary. I really appreciate it.

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