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| Photo Credit: AP. |
US President Joe Biden Friday expressed regret at the Supreme Court decison which overturned the landmark Roe v Wade ruling putting an end to women’s constitutional right to abortion saying, women’s health and life are now “at risk”.
Mr Biden accused the Supreme Court of effectively taking away “a constitutional right from the American people that it had already recognized.”
Speaking at the
White, the President described the ruling as “a sad day for the Court and for
the country.”
On Friday
the Supreme Court overturned the Roe v Wade ruling that gave women unprecedented
rights to abortion in a six to three decision.
The ruling
now means that individual states in the U.S. can ban the procedure especially
Republican controlled states that are most likely to introduce new restrictions
on the procedures or outright ban in most cases.
Thirteen
U.S. States have already passed so-called trigger laws to automatically outlaw
abortion following the Supreme Court’s ruling, according to the BBC. Up to half
of the 50 U.S. states are expected to tighten or introduce new anti-abortion
restrictions.
Mr Biden
said he stood with the Roe v Wade saying it was “the correct decision as a
matter of constitutional law, an application of the fundamental right to
privacy and liberty in matters of family and personal autonomy.”
“It was a
decision on a complex matter that drew a careful balance between a woman’s
right to choose earlier in her pregnancy and the state’s ability to regulate
later in her pregnancy,” Mr Biden added.
The
President said Roe v Wade was a 7 to 2 decision “written by a justice appointed
by a Republican President, Richard Nixon.”
He blamed three
unnamed judges appointed by “one President — Donald Trump — who were the core
of today’s decision to upend the scales of justice and eliminate a fundamental
right for women in this country.”
Regretting the
decision Mr Biden said it will have “real and immediate consequences",
adding that “State laws banning abortion are automatically taking effect today,
jeopardizing the health of millions of women, some without exceptions.”
Biden said
the “fight is not over” and advocated for Congress to restore the protections of
Roe v Wade as federal law.
“This fall,
we must elect more senators and representatives who will codify a woman’s right
to choose into federal law once again, elect more state leaders to protect this
right at the local level,” Mr Biden made a case for more Democrats to be
elected to give them control over the Senate and the House so sweeping reforms
could be put in place.
As the
midterm elections approaches in November, most polls seem to suggest that the
Democrats may lose their majority in the Senate which could make it even harder
to pass any sweeping legislation on the matter.
The Supreme
Court had been considering a case, Dobbs v Jackson Women Health’s organization
that challenged Mississippi’s ban on abortion after 15 weeks, according to The
BBC. The ruling today which is in favor of the state effectively ended the
constitutional right to abortion.