ICYMI: Murray, Democrats Blast Republicans for Blocking Passage of Three Commonsense Bills to Protect Women’s Reproductive Freedoms and Basic Health Care
FACT SHEET: How Donald Trump and his Anti-Abortion Allies Will Try to Rip Away Reproductive Rights from Women Across America with Radical Project 2025 Agenda
Senator Murray: “I cannot stress enough how transparently unserious it is for Trump and Republicans to pretend they are somehow returning abortion ‘to the people’—when in reality, they are doing the exact opposite… Do Republicans really think Americans are that stupid? Do Republicans really think they can take away a constitutional right, and convince us it is a win for freedom? That is insulting.”
*** WATCH: Murray’s floor speech ahead of vote on her Reproductive Freedom for Women Act***
Washington, D.C. — Today, ahead of the vote on her Reproductive Freedom for Women Act, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), a senior member and former Chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, spoke forcefully on the Senate floor about the dystopian horror stories women across the country are experiencing as a direct result of Donald Trump and Republicans’ decades-long effort to overturn Roe v. Wade and pass extreme abortion bans over the will of the American people. Murray urged Republicans to support at least the idea that women should be able to make their own decisions about their pregnancies—and made clear she will continue to hold Republicans to account for their extremism.
The Reproductive Freedom for Women Act is a Sense of Congress bill that simply states: “It is the sense of Congress that— (1) protections for access to abortion rights and other reproductive health care after the Dobbs v. Jackson, 597 U.S. 215 (2022) decision on June 24, 2022, should be supported; and (2) the protections enshrined in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973) should be restored and built upon, moving towards a future where there is reproductive freedom for all.” The text of the bill is HERE.
While Americans continue to experience the catastrophic and continued fallout from the Dobbs decision two years later, Democrats are continuing to keep the spotlight on reproductive rights and fight to pass commonsense and popular bills to protect women’s fundamental reproductive rights—meanwhile, Donald Trump and Republican politicians are working overtime to attack abortion, contraception, and IVF, and ultimately ban abortion nationwide.
“The American people have not just been speaking with their own votes—they have been using their voices and sharing their own personal stories of the nightmares that Republican abortion bans have put them through,” Murray said on the Senate floor today. “I cannot stress enough how transparently unserious it is for Trump and Republicans to pretend they are somehow returning abortion ‘to the people,’ when in reality, they are doing the exact opposite. Republicans are giving politicians power that once belonged to an individual woman—letting politicians force women to stay pregnant—and they are trying to sell that as giving people a bigger voice in this issue.”
“Do Republicans really think Americans are that stupid? Do Republicans really think they can take away a constitutional right, and convince us it’s a win for freedom? That is insulting.” Murray continued, “If Republicans really want to let people make their own decisions on abortion—that is news to me. It would certainly be news to the countless women who have had that choice ripped away from them by Republican politicians over the past two years. But they have a chance to prove it right here, today, right now when we vote on my Reproductive Freedom for Women Act,” Murray said.
“If Republicans are going to force women to stay pregnant, we are going to force them to be honest with the American people about their extreme position. And, by the way, Democrats are going to keep fighting to restore the rights the American people have been so clear that they want back,” Murray concluded.
Yesterday, Murray joined Senators Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) in seeking to pass via unanimous consent three bills to protect women’s fundamental freedoms and reproductive rights: legislation to help more health care professionals get the training and education they need to meet Americans’ dire reproductive health care needs, to protect doctors providing legal abortion care from out-of-state extremists’ attacks, and to protect the freedom to travel across state lines to access needed abortion care. Republicans blocked all three bills—Senator Roger Marshall (R-KS) blocked Senator Baldwin’s Reproductive Health Care Training Act (S. 2024), Senator Tedd Budd (R-NC) blocked Senator Murray’s Let Doctors Provide Reproductive Health Care Act (S. 1297), and Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS) blocked Senator Cortez Masto’s Freedom to Travel for Health Care Act (S. 2053).
Senator Murray is a longtime leader in the fight to protect and expand access to reproductive health care and abortion rights, and she has led Congressional efforts to fight back after the Supreme Court’s disastrous decision overturning Roe v. Wade last year. Murray led her colleagues at the outset of this Congress to make crystal clear that Senate Democrats are continuing to fight to protect every American’s reproductive rights and will be a firewall against Republicans’ continued attacks on women’s rights—and that’s exactly what she’s doing now. Murray has introduced more than a dozen pieces of legislation to protect reproductive rights from further attacks, protect providers, and help ensure women get the care they need; she also co-leads the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would restore the right to abortion nationwide. Ahead of the one-year anniversary of the Dobbs decision, Senator Murray led Senate Democrats in seeking unanimous consent on the Senate floor for four common-sense bills to protect women’s fundamental freedoms, and in January she led her colleagues in hosting a “State of Abortion Rights” briefing with women who have suffered firsthand from Republican abortion bans. On June 4th of this year, Senator Murray chaired a HELP Committee hearing titled “The Assault on Women’s Freedoms: How Abortion Bans Have Created a Health Care Nightmare Across America.” Recently, Murray also helped lead efforts to force Republicans on the record on votes to protect access to contraception and access to IVF—Senate Republicans blocked consideration of both bills, showing once again how extreme and out-of-step they are with the American people. Murray has also led her colleagues in raising the alarm about how a second Trump administration intends to wage an all-out assault on reproductive rights and abortion access in every state, as outlined in Project 2025.
Senator Murray’s full remarks, as delivered on the Senate floor, are below:
“Thank you, Madam. President. Today we are going to vote on a bill that offers a simple statement of values: Do you support a woman’s freedom to make her own health care decisions?
“For the vast majority of Americans, the answer is yes—without a question.
“We know that, because the American people have been speaking out loudly, and repeatedly, and at every opportunity to oppose Republicans’ extreme abortion bans.
“The record here is remarkable, and unmistakable. Since Trump and Republicans succeeded at overturning Roe v. Wade and ripping away a constitutional right from our daughters and granddaughters, every single time abortion rights have been on the ballot—abortion rights have won. Every time!
“But the American people have not just been speaking with their own votes—they have been using their voices, and sharing their own personal stories of the nightmares that Republican abortion bans have put them through.
“Women denied medical care for a miscarriage, because of abortion bans. Women turned away from hospitals because their doctors’ hands were tied until they lost over half of their blood, until their husband found them unconscious on the floor, until the only option was an emergency hysterectomy, or tragically, until it was simply too late.
“Children who couldn’t get abortion care after being raped, a teenager delivering a baby, clutching a teddy bear—forced through pregnancy by Republican politicians.
“This isn’t some dystopian prediction—this has all happened, recently, in the United States of America, because of Donald Trump and Republicans’ anti-abortion extremism.
“Just last month, the New York Times profiled the story of one mother in Idaho who woke up with heavy bleeding in her 20th week of pregnancy. She was leaking amniotic fluid. She went to the emergency room. She was told, nothing they could do there to help her—sorry.
“Because of Idaho’s extreme abortion ban, it meant that any doctor who gave her the abortion care she so desperately needed would be risking their loss of their medical license, and jail time, and heavy fines.
“The best they could do was give her an emergency flight to another state. And when she arrived, nurses remembered her saying: ‘I just need to stay alive so I can be around for my two other kids.’
“That same hospital in Idaho has already had to airlift six pregnant women out of the state for emergency abortion care this year.
“Madam President—this is just one hospital, in one state, and one horrific variation of the many nightmares that are happening on loop across the country, as a direct result of the Republican abortion bans.
“And Madam President, I am going to keep saying it: a forced pregnancy does not have to make headlines to make someone’s life a living hell.
“This is not an issue that Republicans can run away from, no matter how much they try to.
“Donald Trump, a convicted felon and a liar, is trying to tell us he doesn’t know anything about Project 2025—that is the playbook that has been written by some of his top advisors, for him.
“He may as well be saying he has no idea who named Trump Tower.
“We all know Donald Trump ended Roe v. Wade.
“We all know Republicans championed that for decades—and we know that Trump will absolutely ban abortion nationwide.
“Republicans do not get to pretend they support the health of the mother, while ignoring the horror stories happening today across the country and urging the Supreme Court to rule against ensuring abortion is available in emergencies.
“Republicans do not get to pretend that they support IVF and birth control, while championing a national fetal personhood bill, and voting down bills to protect the right to IVF and birth control.
“Republicans do not get to pretend they only want state politicians controlling women’s most personal decisions, while supporting national abortion bans—including the fetal personhood bill I just mentioned—supporting efforts to strike down access to medication abortion nationwide, blocking efforts to protect women who might travel out of state for care, and even blocking protections for doctors in states like mine where abortion is legal.
“And I cannot stress enough how transparently unserious it is for Trump and Republicans to pretend they are somehow returning abortion ‘to the people’—when in reality, they are doing the exact opposite.
“Republicans are giving politicians power that once belonged to an individual woman—letting politicians force women to stay pregnant—and they are trying to sell that as giving people a bigger voice in this issue.
“Do Republicans really think Americans are that stupid? Do Republicans really think they can take away a constitutional right, and convince us it is a win for freedom? That is insulting.
“Here’s an idea—you want to really give the people a say on abortion?
“How about you let each person decide with their doctor what is right for them? How is that for small government? How is that for letting the people decide?
“Madam President, if Republicans really want to let people make their own decisions on abortion—that is news to me.
“It would certainly be news to the countless women who have had that choice ripped away from them by Republican politicians over the past two years.
“But they have a chance to prove it right here, today, right now when we vote on my Reproductive Freedom for Women Act.
“This is a plain, up-or-down vote on whether you support women being able to make their own reproductive health care decisions. It doesn’t force anything, it doesn’t cost anything, it’s actually just a half-page bill simply saying women should have the basic freedom to make their own decisions about their health care.
“Seriously—that is it. As simple as it gets.
“If you care at all—even just the tiniest bit—about protecting women’s access to health care, and allowing women to make their own decisions about their pregnancies, you should support this bill.
“Now make no mistake, I am not going to be holding my breath here today. But I am going to be holding Republicans accountable.
“Donald Trump is trying to rewrite his abortion record—but I will not let him, or anyone else, off the hook.
“If Republicans are going to force women to stay pregnant, we are going to force them to be honest with the American people about their extreme position. And, by the way, Democrats are going to keep fighting to restore the rights the American people have been so clear that they want back.”
###