House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the chamber will vote on a measure Friday that would codify abortion rights nationwide. The bill, however, will unlikely become law under the current Congress.
Another bill unlikely to get through the Senate will be one intended to stop states from penalizing women for crossing state borders to have an abortion.
If House Democrats use their slim majority to send the bills to the Senate, those bills would need 60 votes to break a Senate filibuster. While some have called on Democrats to abolish the filibuster, Sens. Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema both said they oppose such a measure.
“Women's health decisions are her own,” Pelosi said. “They don't belong to politicians in Washington, D. C. or in state capitols or in the Supreme Court of the United States. They belong to a woman, her family, her God, her doctor, her loved ones.”
The bills show that Democrats are eager to use the reversal of Roe v. Wade to their advantage heading into this November’s midterms.
“People don't like it when we say vote, vote in 100 days,” Pelosi said. “People will be voting less fewer than 100 days. People will be voting and we have to elect a couple more Senate Democratic senators so that we can get around the filibuster so that we can pass legislation that truly impacts a woman's right to choose. But there's not a halfway measure. Can't be a little bit pregnant in this. It has to be a real measure that protects a woman's right to choose.”
