Vice President Kamala Harris denounced a federal appeals court ruling that will allow restrictions on the widely-used abortion pill mifepristone and restated the White House’s commitment to protecting abortion rights.
(Bloomberg) — Vice President Kamala Harris denounced a federal appeals court ruling that will allow restrictions on the widely-used abortion pill mifepristone and restated the White House’s commitment to protecting abortion rights.
“If this decision stands, no medication — from chemotherapy drugs, to asthma medicine, to blood pressure pills, to insulin — would be safe from attacks,” Harris said.
The ruling “second guesses” the Food and Drug Administration’s medical experts, threating “the rights of Americans across the country, who can look in their medicine cabinets and find medication prescribed by a doctor because the FDA engaged in a process to determine the efficacy and safety of that medication,” she added.
A divided three-judge panel partly granted the Biden administration’s request to put on hold a Texas court ruling that overturned the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the abortion medication, but put back in place restrictions lifted in 2016 that eased access to the drug.
Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement earlier Thursday that the administration would ask the US Supreme Court to protect the availability of the abortion medication.
“We will be seeking emergency relief from the Supreme Court to defend the FDA’s scientific judgment and protect Americans’ access to safe and effective reproductive care,” Garland said.
Read more: DOJ to Ask Supreme Court to Intervene in Abortion-Pill Case
The drug remains available while the appeals process plays out, but the decision by the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals panel bars the pill from being shipped by mail, and requires use within the first seven weeks of pregnancy, as well as follow-up doctor visits.
The administration remains “firmly committed to protecting access to medication abortion, as the President and I have made clear since the day of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs,” Harris said.
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