On the recordJuly 15, 2022
Madam Speaker, exactly 3 weeks ago, five Justices on an activist, extremist Supreme Court handed down a decision that upended nearly 50 years of precedent and rolled back fundamental rights for millions of Americans. In the weeks since, I have watched in horror as State after State has triggered laws that now prevent a woman or a girl from accessing an abortion even in the case of rape and incest. These events have been shocking to Americans, not only for millions of women across the country but for the country as a whole. You call yourselves conservative. We are talking about 50 years of precedent in our Nation. Because no Government has a place interfering in the decisions between a woman and her doctor, criminalizing abortion, or restricting women's healthcare options. This is not a controversial position to the American people. A strong majority of my constituents believe that the right to an abortion should be protected by law. This is a freedom and a privacy issue, and the government--not politicians in this room and not politicians in any State in our Nation--should not have any part in this conversation at all. This is a very personal decision between a woman, her family, her doctor, and her faith. Madam Speaker, I encourage all of my colleagues to join me in voting ``yes'' to protect Roe today.





