Democrats spearheaded by United States Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi are seeking to codify Roe v. Wade as Republican states push to ban abortions after the Supreme Court officially banned abortions from six weeks onwards in Texas.
The Christian Headlines reported that Pelosi intends to lead the House of Representatives in overturning the Texas Heartbeat Act by enshrining "Roe v. Wade" into a law. While The Christian Post said Pelosi plans to vote for abortion rights through the Women's Health Protection Act when the House resumes from recess in the face of states expressing consideration to ban abortion just like Texas did.
Pelosi's announced plans came after President Joe Biden blasted the Texas Heartbeat Act and reinforced his administration's deep commitment to abortion as he has conveyed on the very first day he took seat in office. Despite claiming to be a "Devout Catholic," Biden called the said law "extreme" and "unconstitutional."
The Texas Heartbeat Law or Senate Bill 8 came in effect on Wednesday after the Supreme Court rejected the emergency request filed by Planned Parenthood and American Civil Liberties Union to block its implementation. The Supreme Court's rejection of the request, however, came without deciding on the law's constitutionality. Following the Supreme Court decision on the said law, the Republican states of South Dakota and Florida have expressed desires to enact a similar law after Texas'.
Pelosi, a professed Catholic herself, released a statement a day after SB8 was implemented. She called the law "the most restrictive abortion ban in fifty years" and condemned the Supreme Court as "cowardly" for allowing it to take effect.
"The Supreme Court's cowardly, dark-of-night decision to uphold a flagrantly unconstitutional assault on women's rights and health is staggering. That this radically partisan Court chose to do so without a full briefing, oral arguments or providing a full, signed opinion is shameful," Pelosi said.
"Upon our return, the House will bring up Congresswoman Judy Chu's Women's Health Protection Act to enshrine into law reproductive health care for all women across America," she revealed.
According to Pelosi, SB8 is a "catastrophe," "most extreme," "most disturbing," and an evasion of the Constitution for its "chilling effect" on women and women's health care, especially those who are in Texas.
"SB8 delivers catastrophe to women in Texas, particularly women of color and women from low-income communities. Every woman, everywhere has the constitutional right to basic health care. SB8 is the most extreme, dangerous abortion ban in half a century, and its purpose is to destroy Roe v. Wade, and even refuses to make exceptions for cases of rape and incest. This ban necessitates codifying Roe v. Wade," Pelosi remarked.
"SB8 unleashes one of the most disturbing, unprecedented and far-reaching assaults on health care providers--and on anyone who helps a woman, in any way, access an abortion--by creating a vigilante bounty system that will have a chilling effect on the provision of any reproductive health care services," she added.
"This provision is a cynical, backdoor attempt by partisan lawmakers to evade the Constitution and the law to destroy not only a woman's right to health care but potentially any right or protection that partisan lawmakers target."
Pelosi expressed disappointment on the Supreme Court's decision since they have even urged "it to uphold" the dissent of Justice Sonia Sotomayor when the high court announced to review the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization--also known as the Mississippi case--in May. Pelosi particularly cited Sotomayor's dissent regarding states banning abortion, "'its constitutional obligations to protect not only the rights of women, but also the sanctity of its precedents and of the rule of law.'"
It's worth noting that abortion is nowhere to be found in the U.S. Constitution, and that the "right to an abortion" is not a constitutional right, according to a judge.
"Nothing in the text or original understanding of the Constitution established a right to an abortion," 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge James Ho said earlier this year.
