Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, U.S. Vice President, speaks during a campaign rally at Shell Energy Stadium in Houston, Texas, on October 25, 2024.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images
Vice President Kamala Harris Already done abortion It was a central issue in her bid for the White House, promising to expand and protect women’s ability to terminate pregnancies if she was elected to the nation’s highest office.
The vice president’s pledge comes as the country is still reeling from the effects of the pandemic. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wadewhich has protected the U.S. Constitution’s right to abortion for the past half century. Since that ruling, 13 states Abortion has been completely banned.
“One does not have to give up her faith or her deep-seated beliefs to simply agree that the government should not tell her what to do with her body,” Harris said in her closing remarks on the Ellipse lawn in Washington on Tuesday night. More than 60,000 supporters cheered loudly.
But what can Harris actually do to support abortion in the post-Roe era? The question is at the heart of a key dynamic in presidential elections: a partisan gender divide with few precedents in modern politics.
one October NBC News Poll It shows that the gender gap between Harris and Republican Donald Trump reaches 30 percentage points, with 16% of male voters supporting Trump and 14% of female voters supporting Harris.
This divide between male and female voters has everything to do with the issue of abortion. According to the final New York Times election poll, Abortion and the economy are top issues among potential female voters. Among all registered voters, male or female, only the economy ranks higher than abortion as an influence on voter choice.
However, if Harris is elected president, she may find it difficult to restore abortion rights nationwide, said Alina Salganicoff, KFF senior vice president and director of the Women’s Health Policy Program.
Even so, she said, a Harris administration could increase access to medical abortion and, more importantly, counter attempts by Republicans and activists to further restrict reproductive rights.
Restoring Roy-era protections unlikely
Experts say restoring abortion rights in the United States will be challenging, if not impossible. That would require a significant change in the makeup of the Supreme Court or an act of Congress.
“It’s hard to imagine either in the near future,” Salgarnikov said.
Harris said she would sign a bill in Congress that would reestablish abortion rights, but such legislation is unlikely to gain current support in the Senate. 60 votes threshold. A bill will come into effect in May 2022 Codify abortion rights The Senate failed by a vote of 49 to 51. All Republicans oppose the measure.
Anti-abortion demonstrators listen to U.S. President Donald Trump’s speech at the 47th annual March for Life in Washington, D.C., on January 24, 2020.
Olivier Doulieri | AFP | Getty Images
Some Democratic lawmakers, including Harris, have expressed support for eliminating the Senate filibuster, which would allow bills to pass with a simple majority rather than the 60 votes currently needed to end legislative debate and advance legislation in the 100-member Senate.
“I’ve been very clear that I think we should eliminate the obstruction of Roe and get us to the 51-vote level to actually put laws protecting reproductive freedoms back into law,” Harris said at the September meeting. “Interview Wisconsin Public Radio.
it is Not sure Democrats can get even a simple majority Mary Ziegler, a legal historian who studies the U.S. abortion debate, said hearings in the Senate this November are necessary to eliminate the filibuster. That could change in the midterm elections, though, Ziegler said.
Even with enough votes, some Democrats may worry that lowering the Senate voting threshold could backfire on them and abortion access, she said.
“Democrats have historically been anxious about this because they don’t have the tools to defeat new abortion bans if Republicans pass them,” Ziegler said.
Other ways the U.S. is protecting abortion
Harris support repeal The Hyde Amendment is a congressional rider that limits federal spending on abortions in cases of rape, incest, or life-threatening pregnancies. Because of this restriction, women on Medicaid may be forced to pay out of pocket for abortions, which can cost $600 or more in some cases. Experts say the rule will have the greatest impact on low-income women and women of color.
“Harris has been an outspoken supporter of repealing the Hyde Amendment,” Ziegler said.
But Ziegler said “she needs Congress” to do that. “If Democrats don’t control Congress, it’s going to be difficult.”
However, she added, “It would be huge to have a president pushing for this.”
On January 20, 2023, in Washington, abortion rights activists and anti-abortion demonstrators held signs during the annual March for Life for the first time since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Roe v. Wade abortion ruling.
Jonathan Ernst | Reuters
Harris could also pursue a number of avenues to make medical abortion more accessible. According to statistics, by 2023, medical abortion will account for 63% of total abortions in the United States, up from 53% in 2020. Guttmacher Institute.
“There could be many reasons for the increase, including the recent availability of abortion pills via telemedicine,” KFF’s Salganicoff said, adding that Harris could look for more ways to provide abortion pills.
Harris Administration Won’t Enforce Comstock Actwas a controversial federal law passed in 1873 that prohibited the mailing of obscene materials. In Plan 2025, the conservative blueprint for governing that former President Donald Trump tried to disavow. Author calls for using Victorian law as alternative abortion banprohibiting the distribution of abortion pills and other abortion-related materials by mail.
“They believed that if Planned Parenthood ordered scalpels for a medical supply company, it would be a federal crime,” Ziegler said.
Pictured here is the Madison South Health Center, owned and operated by Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin.
Wang Kaiwen|Associated Press
No matter who is in the White House, anti-abortion groups could bring a lawsuit to the Supreme Court and convince judges that the Comstock Act should be used to ban mailed abortion materials, Ziegler said.
But she said enforcement of the ruling would be handled by the U.S. Department of Justice, which would be another area where Harris could play a role.
“The Harris administration cannot change the rhetoric of the Supreme Court, but it may deprioritize these prosecutions,” Ziegler said. “The Department of Justice will always have limited resources and will prioritize certain prosecutions.”
Harris is also likely to oppose efforts by Republicans and anti-abortion groups to invalidate the Food and Drug Administration’s approval mifepristoneusing Terminate pregnancy“, experts said.
Her administration may also take on other legal challenges to further restrict abortion, such as state laws that ban emergency abortion care for patients when their health is at risk. The Biden administration has argued that depriving people of this care violates emtalaor the Emergency Medical and Labor Act. This federal law requires hospitals to provide health-protecting treatment to people who need it when they come into the emergency room.
“Some states that ban abortion provide only life exceptions and no health exceptions,” Salganikov said.
Abortion ballot measure in jeopardy
People cast in-person early votes for the 2024 election at the Northwest Events Center on October 29, 2024 in Detroit, Michigan.
Jeff Kowalski | AFP | Getty Images
This election, 10 states have proposed ballot measures that would increase access to abortion. In Arizona, Florida, Missouri and South Dakota, the amendment would overturn existing abortion laws and essentially protect abortion rights until the fetus is viable, with some exceptions after that.
Ziegler said if Harris wins, the measures will have a better chance of passing than if Trump wins.
“A Harris administration will mean these protections can remain in place,” she said. “If Trump is elected president, it’s less clear.”
trump card attributed to The Supreme Court decided to overturn Roe v. Wade and recognized his role in selecting three conservative justices who voted against it. Trump said during the campaign He won’t sign a national abortion ban. However, some experts are skeptical of that commitment given the former president’s record. Ziegler said federal policy would likely supersede any ballot measure that passes.
“Preserving the access that already exists would be one of the less glamorous but important things” that Harris could do, Ziegler said.
In fact, if the vice president wins, Salgarnikov said, her biggest impact on abortion will be to prevent the possible deterioration of rights under another Trump administration.
“Your question is: ‘What can Harris do?'” she said. “The question is: What would a government that doesn’t believe abortion access should be protected do? They could do a lot more to dismantle abortion access than they do today.”
