Posted on 10/20/2017 7:15:05 AM PDT by Morgana
Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), along with 35 of her Democratic colleagues in the Senate, introduced a bill Thursday that would repeal the Trump Administration’s recent broadening of exemptions from the Obamacare contraceptive mandate for employers with religious and moral objections.
The “Protect Access to Birth Control Act” is brief, stating that the religious and moral exemptions “shall have no force or effect, and shall be treated as though such rules had never taken effect.”
“President Trump wants to make birth control about ideology, but let’s be clear: for women and their families in the 21st century, birth control is about being healthy and financially secure—and that’s why Democrats are going to keep fighting back against his shameful attacks on women with this bill and any other way we can,” Sen. Murray said of the legislation.
Her colleague Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) claimed, “this Administration has continued to roll back women’s health and women’s rights. Women must have access to vital preventive health care, including birth control, and employers should not be allowed to cherry-pick essential benefits. This legislation protects women’s access to contraceptives and birth control, no matter who their boss is.”
Four Democrats plan to introduce similar legislation in the House. Both bills are unlikely to be brought to the floor by House and Senate Republicans.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is currently suing the Trump administration over the religious exemptions arguing that the rules violate the Establishment Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution by “authorizing and promoting religiously motivated and other discrimination against women seeking reproductive health care.”
The Little Sisters of the Poor, who care for the elderly poor in the U.S., are finally beginning to see some relief along with other nonprofit religious organizations that had been involved in a five-year long lawsuit against the Obama administration over the contraceptive mandate.
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Paying for or supporting the use of contraception is contrary to fundamental Catholic moral teaching. The Obama administration offered the groups an accommodation that would delegate the contraception coverage to a third party, but they objected that the process still left them complicit in the coverage. Their case had been remanded to appeals courts with direction from the Supreme Court that the Obama administration and the organizations work out a compromise.
Mark Rienzi, senior counsel with the Becket Fund representing the Little Sisters in court, called the exemptions a “victory for common sense.”
“The previous administration pursued a needless and divisive culture war,” he said. “It was always ridiculous to claim you need nuns to give out contraceptives. This new rule shows that you don’t.”
The dems alone, don't have the votes.
Any R's who voted for it would be nuked come election time.
We sort of figured out what their party was all about when they booed God at their convention.
I remember before the vote that gave us Obamacare, the President assured everyone that taxpayers would not be required to fund abortion. I consider this one of his greatest lies to the American people.
Pay for your own recreation.
It’s not about the votes...
It’s about abusing the legislative process to paint republicans as against contraceptions...
Obama’s pen doesn’t work anymore ,guys ,LOL
I completely understand their need for abortion.
There are so many powerful people (Clinton, Weinstein, etc) who rape women all the time that without abortion those powerful people would have to take some responsibility for their actions,..... and that will never happen.
Not hard to turn that back against the D's.
The only ones who will believe it, are the D's sycophants. They'll follow the party line anyway.
Abortion isn't a middle of the road issue for those who ACTUALLY vote. Dems can scream and holler and fuss and fidget all they want.
They aren't going to draw any more to their side, at the ballot box, on this issue.
That means it's the R's to lose.
Any R's who flop will be nuked, possibly giving that seat to the D's.
This reminds me of all the Republican bills to repeal obamacare when he was prez. :)
Never thought of it that way / S
I'll even raise the bar a little more. The sponsors of this bill will ultimately have to round up enough support to override the inevitable veto if this legislation passes both houses of Congress.
Sort of?...
EGGZACTLEE!!!
What are those same people doing today, now that they have control???
(crickets)
Oh, Yeah, Trump will sign that for sure, soon as it passes!
Waste of time on tax payer dime, these people don’t care how wasteful and spiteful they are.
The whole thing has become a joke and source of entertainment for me - in a sort of “fiddle while Rome burns” sort of way.
man, those people are dead set on making as many people as possible accessories to their murder plots.
These phony first amendment lovers seem to have forgotten “Congress shall make no law...”
I guess Congress should not have given their powers to the HHS Secretary and the Executive Branch.
The progressives will be begging Trump to put a new law in place
Praying that this bill is defeated.
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