Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced on May 22 that the Senate will vote on a bill to protect access to contraception in the coming weeks.
The measure, which is expected to be blocked by Senate Republicans, would force lawmakers to declare their positions on an issue that Democrats are looking to campaign on heading into the election.
“Now more than ever, contraception is a critical piece of protecting women’s reproductive freedoms, standing as nothing short of a vital lifeline for millions of American women across the country,” Mr. Schumer said on the Senate floor on May 22.
The announcement came after controversy surrounding comments made by former President Donald Trump during an interview in which he suggested that he was contemplating restrictions on contraception.
Responding to media reporting on the interview, President Trump posted on Truth Social that he “will never advocate imposing restrictions on birth control or other contraceptives.”
“Women across the country are already suffering from Donald Trump’s post-Roe nightmare, and if he wins a second term, it’s clear he wants to go even further by restricting access to birth control and emergency contraceptives,” Biden–Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said in a statement.
During the May 21 interview, the host asked President Trump, “Do you support any restrictions on a person’s right to contraception?”
The former president replied: “We’re looking at that, and I’m going to have a policy on that very shortly, and I think it’s something you'll find interesting.”
He later suggested a policy that would allow states to adopt their own policies regarding the issue of contraception.
“Things really do have a lot to do with the states, and some states are going to have different policies than others,” President Trump said.
The Supreme Court is due to release a decision about the legality of the mailing of mifepristone in the coming months.
In 1965, the Supreme Court decided in Griswold v. Connecticut that married couples had an implied right to sexual privacy in the 14th Amendment, which protected their use of contraception. This right was later used to expand access to contraception to women who were not married and, in 1973, to declare abortion a national right with the Roe v. Wade decision, which was overturned in 2022.
