FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 24, 2022

Contact: danielle@newheightscommunications.com 

WASHINGTON, DC –  Co-Executive Directors of the Center for Popular Democracy Action Analilia Mejia and DaMareo Cooper released the following statement in response to the SCOTUS decision to overturn Roe v. Wade today: 

“Make no mistake: the end of Roe is a devastating attack on our freedoms and our democracy itself. Our constitutional system exists to defend each person’s right and liberty to decide their fate, choose their faith, and build families as we see fit. Attacks on abortion harm Black, Brown, and poor people chiefly. Those who can afford to travel can always access needed health care—people who can't function at the mercy of systems that neither see nor care for their well-being. There is no gender equality without reproductive freedom and the right to dictate our futures. From slavery to the present day, reproductive coercsion and control is a tactic utilized by the state to uphold white supremacy and strip marginalized communities of their autonomy. That racist legacy is perpetuated with today’s decision. 

Today, SCOTUS has ignored the vast majority of Americans who support abortion rights and put our right to privacy in grave peril. In Roe, the Court held that "liberty" in the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment included a right to privacy. By rejecting this holding, Justice Alito makes way for future decisions to eliminate marriage equality, contraceptive access, trans rights, and more.

The reactionary, right-wing majority in the Supreme Court today is no accident. Historic anti-democratic and racist systems such as the Electoral College, unrepresentative Senate, and filibuster have directly contributed to this crisis. Democracy—which has yet to meet its promise to all people—is under attack.

Now that Roe and Casey have been overturned, the Biden Administration and our elected leadership must take critical steps to safeguard our right to abortion, including: 

• Increasing funding for Dire Need grants that provide family planning services through Title X;

• Increasing access to telehealth appointments for a range of healthcare services, including reproductive healthcare;

• Providing funding for people traveling across state lines for medical procedures, including reproductive care;

• Bringing legal challenges against states banning the use of RU-486, an FDA approved medication that states are arguably preempted from blocking access to;

• Finding ways to site reproductive care clinics on federal lands and working with tribal governments to establish clinics on tribal lands.

• Abolishing the filibuster to codify Roe

• Passing the Judiciary Act to expand the Court”

Representatives from the Center for Popular Democracy Action are available for media interviews. 

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The Center for Popular Democracy Action works to create equity, opportunity, and a dynamic democracy in partnership with high-impact base-building organizations, organizing alliances, and progressive unions. We work on campaigns that promote a pro-worker, pro-immigrant, racial and economic justice agenda and win victories to improve people’s lives.