Restore the right to abortion | Passing a law in Congress would be the “fastest route”, says Joe Biden

(Washington) Criticized for his defense of the right to abortion, deemed timorous, Joe Biden tried on Friday to regain the initiative, with a muscular speech on the need for a massive electoral mobilization in the next legislative elections against a Supreme Court “out of control” and the “extreme” projects of the Republicans.

“For the love of God, there are elections in November, vote, vote, vote,” the President of the United States asked at the White House. Clearly, he demanded a strong Democratic parliamentary majority, which he does not have today.

“It’s the fastest way” to restore the right to abortion nationwide, through federal law, he said, in his second speech since America’s top court ruled. dynamited on June 24 the jurisprudence which, since 1973, protected the right to abortion on all the American territory.

If the Republican Party won these midterm elections in November, and instead voted for a law banning abortion across the country, and no longer in only conservative states, Joe Biden has promised to veto it.

His intervention, the pretext of which was the signing of a decree with a limited scope on access to abortion, was above all for the president an attempt to regain control in the face of insistent criticism in his own camp.

Many Democrats and activists believe Joe Biden and his administration should take more dramatic action. Or failing that, be more politically aggressive, which the 79-year-old Democrat, a moderate who is reluctant to show off, tried to do on Friday.

“Brute political force”

He unleashed his punches on an “out of control” Supreme Court and said its decision on abortion was “not a constitutional judgment, but an exercise in brute political force”.

He also castigated the “radical” positions of the Republican Party. “Now is the time … to protect the nation from an extremist project”, which could also call into question the right to contraception or marriage for all, said Joe Biden.

Joe Biden then signed an executive order to protect access to abortion. But the initiatives he has presented have only a limited scope, in a country where presidential power, however great it may seem, does not weigh heavily against the powers of the States, if it cannot also rely on the judiciary and the legislative power.

The White House promises to “combat digital surveillance”, the potential use of private data against women who have had abortions.

The text signed on Friday also plans to protect mobile clinics practicing abortion at the external borders of states that have banned it, to guarantee access to the morning after pill and to IUDs, and to organize a network of volunteer lawyers.

creative

Will this attempt at electoral mobilization by Joe Biden succeed, coming from an unpopular president, and while galloping inflation is the biggest concern of households?

Shortly after Joe Biden’s speech, Jen Klein, an adviser responsible for abortion-related issues, had a tough time during the daily White House briefing.

“We have taken an important step today and we continue to examine all options that would be legally relevant,” she said. But she struggled to explain the concrete scope of the decree signed on Friday, and to justify that the text comes two weeks after the decision of the Supreme Court, yet predictable since a draft had leaked in the press before.

The Women’s March organization, which wants to demonstrate on Sunday in front of the White House, reacted very coldly to Friday’s announcements.

These are “necessary first steps, but they are far from enough. […] I call on the administration to realize the urgency. Be creative! said Rachel O’Leary Carmona, executive director of the association.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives and figure of the Democratic camp Nancy Pelosi has meanwhile promised to put two bills to a vote next week: one to enshrine a right to federal abortion and the other to protect the women who leave their state to have an abortion. But these texts will never see the light of day, for lack of a strong enough parliamentary majority.