House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) concludes a press conference after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which guarantees a woman’s right to abortion, at the Capitol Visitor Center on June 24, 2022 in Washington, D.C. Colombia.
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Monday that House Democrats were examining legislation to protect personal data stored in reproductive health applications, guarantee the right to free travel between states and codify the right to abortion after the Supreme Court overturned the remarkable case of Roe v. Wade.
The ideas, presented by Pelosi to fellow Democrats in the House of Representatives in a letter Monday, followed a court ruling Friday that violated nearly 50 years of abortion rights in the United States. The decision has sparked outrage across the country from proponents of access to abortion in the days since.
“This weekend, the American people spoke in person and in large numbers about their opposition to the Supreme Court’s disrespect for a woman’s freedom of her reproductive health,” wrote Pelosi, a Democrat from California. “As this extremist Supreme Court works to punish and control the American people, Democrats must continue our struggle to expand freedom in America.”
Her letter offers three early ideas that Democrats weigh in response to the decision.
The first approach will seek to protect “the most intimate and personal data of women” stored in reproductive health applications. “Many fear,” Pelosi writes, “that this information could be used against women by a sinister prosecutor in a country that criminalizes abortion.”
Such applications, including Flo of Flo Health, allow women to monitor their menstruation, prepare for conception, pregnancy, early motherhood and menopause. Although the company did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment, factual information published by the business shows that about 32 million people used its application each month and that 12 million became pregnant while using the platform by May 2020.
The second idea would be to pass legislation that repeats the constitutional right to free travel in the United States, ensuring that residents of states that prohibit abortion can perform the procedure in a way that allows it.
The third will codify abortion rights, as set out in Roe’s 1973 decision in a bill known as the Women’s Health Act.
The chances of such legislation reaching President Joe Biden for signing are slim because it will face established opposition from Republicans in the Senate.
Current Senate rules dictate that a majority party must garner 60 votes to overcome an indefinite filibuster organized by the minority opposition. As Democrats have a razor-sharp majority in the Senate split 50-50 – with Vice President Kamala Harris the key tiebreak – the bill must receive 60 votes to be passed.
Pelosi acknowledged these great chances in his letter, but insisted that Democrats should fully consider abolishing the filibuster rule.
“It is essential that we defend and expand our majority in the House of Representatives and the Senate in November so that we can eliminate abuse so that we can restore women’s fundamental rights – and freedom for every American,” she wrote.
With the exception of eliminating the filibuster, Democrats have little legislative power to oppose the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn its previous decision.
Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told voters in his home state of Kentucky that Republicans and Democrats are far apart in any bipartisan compromise.
“In the Senate, most things require 60 votes,” he said. “No country has come close to 60 votes on this issue. So I think it’s likely that all this will be condemned, considered in different states in the country. “
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