President Biden Signs Executive Order to Protect Abortion Access

“In the face of this health crisis, the Federal Government is taking action to protect healthcare service delivery and promote access to critical reproductive healthcare services, including abortion. It remains the policy of my Administration to support women’s right to choose and to protect and defend reproductive rights. Doing so is essential to justice, equality, and our health, safety, and progress as a Nation,” the order reads.

The President said the order will safeguard access to abortion care and contraceptives, protect patient privacy and establish an interagency task force to use “every federal tool available to protect access to reproductive health care,” via CNN.

It will also increase public education efforts and bolster the security of and the legal options available to those seeking and providing abortion services, via the White House.

However, there is no action the President can take to restore the nationwide right to an abortion.

Biden said he was asking the Justice Department, “much like they did in the civil rights era, to do something, to do everything in their power to protect these women seeking to invoke their rights.”

Biden also said the fastest way to restore abortion rights was for the American people to elect more members of Congress in November’s midterm elections who are pro-choice.

“We need two additional pro choice senators and a pro choice house to codify Roe as federal law. Your vote can make that a reality,” he said, via The Hill.

He said it was his “hope and strong belief that women will in fact turn out in record numbers to reclaim the rights that have been taken from them by the court. Let me be clear: While I wish it had not come to this, this is the fastest route available.”

More than a dozen states have either banned abortion outright or enacted strict limitations, and about a dozen more have indicated more restrictions are coming soon.