Heinrich, Baldwin, Warren, and 38 Senators Introduce Resolution Affirming Support for Medication Abortion

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies, joined U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), and 38 of their Senate colleagues in introducing a resolution in support of equitable, science-based policies governing access to medication abortion.

Resolution text can be found here.

This resolution expresses the sense of Congress that the scientific judgment of the FDA that mifepristone is safe and effective should be respected, and that law and policy governing access to life-saving, time-sensitive medication abortion care in the United States should be equitable and based on science. 

The resolution also affirms that mifepristone is safe and effective, while acknowledging the significant harm that would be posed to both health care providers and patients across the nation if mifepristone were sharply curtailed.

This action comes as Americans continue to grapple with the reversal of Roe v. Wade, and follows last week’s announcement that the Supreme Court will hear a challenge to medication abortion access.

Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, reproductive rights have been increasingly under attack, with more than a dozen states banning or restricting access to abortion care, and anti-abortion extremists attempting to ban medication abortion nationwide. Medication abortion is currently used for over half of all abortions.

Along with Heinrich, Warren and Baldwin, the resolution was co-sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Angus King (I-Maine), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Laphonza Butler (D-Calif.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Tom Carper (D-Del.), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.).

The resolution has been endorsed by Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Physicians for Reproductive Health, Power to Decide, National Council of Jewish Women, The Century Foundation’s Health Equity and Reform Team, National Partnership for Women and Families, Guttmacher Institute, Center for Reproductive Rights, Reproductive Freedom for All (formerly NARAL Pro-Choice America), In Our Own Voice: National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda and the EMAA Project.

Background:           

• In May 2023, Heinrich cosponsored the Protecting Service Members and Military Families’ Access to Health Care Act to codify the Department of Defense’s (DOD) February 16, 2023 policy to ensure service members and their families can access non-covered reproductive health care, including abortion services, regardless of the state in which they are stationed.
• In April 2023, Heinrich joined an amicus brief to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in the case of Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA, in support of the Biden administration’s appeal of Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk’s ruling that suspends the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) more than 20-year-old approval of mifepristone.
• In April 2023, Heinrich, as Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies, presided over a hearing on the President’s Fiscal Year 2024 Budget Request for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Heinrich expressed his strongly held view that the “decisions the FDA makes, whether approving a medical device or approving a new drug, must be guided by science and not by political pressure.”
• In a statement in April 2023, Senator Heinrich said that a recent federal court ruling by a judge in Texas has “undermined the FDA’s safety and efficacy determination of Mifepristone. And with it, he has undermined the FDA’s authority to determine the safety and efficacy of all medications – from insulin to cancer treatment.”
• In March 2023, Heinrich cosponsored the Women’s Health Protection Act to prohibit states from imposing restrictions that jeopardize access to abortion earlier in pregnancy, including many of the state-level restrictions in place prior to Dobbs, such as arbitrary waiting periods, medically unnecessary mandatory ultrasounds, or requirements to provide medically inaccurate information. The bill would also ensure that later in pregnancy, states cannot limit access to abortion if it would jeopardize the life or health of the mother and protect the ability to travel out of state for an abortion, which has become increasingly common in recent years.
• In September 2022, Heinrich urged the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to take immediate action to safeguard women’s privacy and their ability to safely and confidentially get the health care they need.
• In September 2021, Heinrich joined a group of 48 Democrats in the U.S. Senate and 188 in the U.S. House of Representatives that filed a bicameral amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to uphold nearly 50 years of precedent in Roe v. Wade and protect the constitutional right to abortion care.