Skip to content
Center for Reproductive Rights
Center for Reproductive Rights

Primary Menu

  • About
    • Overview
    • Center Leadership & Staff
    • Pro Bono Program
    • Creative Council
    • Annual Reports
    • Contact Us
    • Careers
    • Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
  • Work
    • Overview
    • Litigation
    • Legal Policy and Advocacy
    • Resources & Research
    • Recent Case Highlights
    • Landmark Cases
    • World’s Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
  • Issues
    • Overview
    • Abortion
    • Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
    • Assisted Reproduction
    • Contraception
    • Humanitarian Settings
    • Maternal Health
    • COVID-19
  • Regions
    • Overview
    • Africa
    • Asia
    • Europe
    • Latin America and the Caribbean
    • United States
    • Global Advocacy
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Center in the Spotlight
    • Events
    • Press Releases
    • Press Room
    • Newsletters
  • Resources
    • Resources & Research
    • World Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
    • Take Action Toolkit
  • Act
    • Overview
    • Give
    • Act
    • Learn
  • Donate
    • Make a Gift Now
    • Be a Champion
    • Join the Advocates Council
    • Become a Major Donor
    • Give Through Your Donor-Advised Fund
    • Make a Gift In Honor
    • Attend an Event
    • Leave a Legacy
    • More Ways to Give
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • LinkedIn
Donate
icon-hamburger icon-magnifying-glass Donate
icon-magnifying-glass-teal
Center for Reproductive Rights - Center for Reproductive Rights - search logo
search Close Close icon
Center for Reproductive Rights -
Menu Close Menu Close icon
Donate

Primary Menu

  • About
    • Overview
    • Center Leadership & Staff
    • Pro Bono Program
    • Creative Council
    • Annual Reports
    • Contact Us
    • Careers
    • Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
  • Work
    • Overview
    • Litigation
    • Legal Policy and Advocacy
    • Resources & Research
    • Recent Case Highlights
    • Landmark Cases
    • World’s Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
  • Issues
    • Overview
    • Abortion
    • Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
    • Assisted Reproduction
    • Contraception
    • Humanitarian Settings
    • Maternal Health
    • COVID-19
  • Regions
    • Overview
    • Africa
    • Asia
    • Europe
    • Latin America and the Caribbean
    • United States
    • Global Advocacy
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Center in the Spotlight
    • Events
    • Press Releases
    • Press Room
    • Newsletters
  • Resources
    • Resources & Research
    • World Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
    • Take Action Toolkit
  • Act
    • Overview
    • Give
    • Act
    • Learn
  • Donate
    • Make a Gift Now
    • Be a Champion
    • Join the Advocates Council
    • Become a Major Donor
    • Give Through Your Donor-Advised Fund
    • Make a Gift In Honor
    • Attend an Event
    • Leave a Legacy
    • More Ways to Give
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • LinkedIn

Related Content

Issues:

Funding for Reproductive Healthcare, Public Funding

Regions:

United States

Work:

Engaging Policymakers, In Washington D.C., Reporting on Rights

Type:

News, Story

Follow the Center

Donate Now

Join Now

  • Hidden

03.19.2013

Engaging Policymakers Funding for Reproductive Healthcare United States News

Under Federal Attack

Justin Goldberg

Share this Story

  • facebook
  • Twitter
  • linkedin
  • Email id
reproductiverights.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/crr_FH_GR_Wrapup112.jpg
Under Federal Attack

The most unpopular Congress in history didn’t take that title by accident or through a stroke of bad luck. The 112th Congress, which came to an end just a few months ago, earned a record-setting rate of disapproval from U.S. voters because of its legislative record.  



As historians look back at the 112th Congress, they will certainly pay much attention to politicians who rose to prominence on a platform purported to be interested solely in shrinking government. Yet many of them demonstrated extreme positions when it came to reproductive rights, aggressively pushing for governmental interference in a woman’s decision about her health.



The bottom line: over the two-year session, members of Congress filed at least 87 bills containing provisions aimed at dismantling reproductive rights. The Center for Reproductive Rights has documented the depth and breadth of this unrelenting campaign in Under Attack: Reproductive Rights in the 112th Congress. 



The good news is that some lawmakers in the House and Senate vigorously defended women’s reproductive health and freedom, and almost none of the retrograde proposals pursued by anti-choice legislators succeeded. But there were more than a few scares.



First and foremost, this Congress took direct aim at the historic legislation that was the centerpiece of the previous Congress. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), passed in 2010, will ultimately deliver health insurance to tens of millions of people who need it. The new law also expands preventative care to include contraception, meaning that women will no longer have to pay hundreds of dollars a year (at a minimum) in co-payments for medication that keeps women and their families healthy, and actually saves hundreds of millions in costs by preventing unintended pregnancies.



The House of Representatives voted to repeal the ACA 33 times during the 112th Congress. And the contraception benefit was directly targeted by proposals that would have allowed employers to pick and choose the health care their employees can access through their insurance plans. Opponents of the contraception benefit went to great lengths to try to force such a measure into law, including by attaching it to a major, must-pass transportation bill.



The House of Representatives holds the nation’s purse strings, so anti-choice politicians also tried to use fiscal matters as a way to choke off access to reproductive health care. The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act sought to ban private abortion coverage in state health insurance exchanges and use federal funding as a way to stop health facilities from offering abortion services. The cynically named Protect Life Act would have prevented abortion coverage in the state exchanges if even one participant received federal assistance to pay insurance premiums. This measure ultimately became known in reproductive rights circles as the “Let Women Die Act” because it also tried to give hospitals the right to refuse women emergency abortion services.



Most Americans wanted Congress to focus on the economy, but they may have gotten more focus than they bargained for when the House nearly shut down the government over defunding Planned Parenthood.



The House also exerts tremendous influence over policy in the District of Columbia. One of the few successes of anti-choice politicians occurred when they used the budget process to deny the District its right to provide abortion coverage with nonfederal funds.



These are just a few of the misguided pieces of legislation that distracted Congress from the problems Americans most wanted solved. And voters took notice. The November elections saw a fierce backlash against the ugly rhetoric of anti-choice politicians, most of whom were sent packing.



The 112th Congress didn’t achieve much in the way of setting back reproductive rights, but it did send a loud message about the intentions of more than just a few rogue senators and representatives. This report documents the animus in thorough detail. Now we must fight to make sure it’s not a chapter in our history that we’re forced to relive again and again. 


reproductiverights.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/crr_GR_wrapUp_3.13.pdf
  • Download Attachment

Related Posts

Testimony of the Center for Reproductive Rights on the Graham-Cassidy-Heller-Johnson Proposal

The Center for Reproductive Rights respectfully submits the following testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance in strong opposition...

Abortion, Legal Restrictions, Other Barriers, Contraception, Legal Restrictions, Funding for Reproductive Healthcare, Other Financial Barriers, Right to Care, Maternal Health,United States,Engaging Policymakers

Center for Reproductive Rights Supplemental Testimony: HR 3 and HR 358

The Center for Reproductive Rights uses the law to advance reproductive freedom as a fundamental human right that all governments...

Abortion, Anti-Choice Harassment, Legal Restrictions, Funding for Reproductive Healthcare,United States,Engaging Policymakers, In Washington D.C.

Center for Reproductive Rights Testimony: H.R. 3

Center for Reproductive Rights Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Select Revenue Measures, Committee on Ways and Means, United States House...

Abortion, Anti-Choice Harassment, Legal Restrictions, Funding for Reproductive Healthcare,United States,Engaging Policymakers, In Washington D.C.

Sign up for our newsletter.

The most up-to-date news on reproductive rights, delivered straight to you.

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Footer Menu

  • Careers
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact Us

Center for Reproductive Rights
© (1992-2021)

Use of this site signifies agreement with our disclaimer and privacy policy.

Center for Reproductive Rights
This site uses necessary, analytics and social media cookies to improve your experience and deliver targeted advertising. Click "Options" or click here to learn more and customize your cookie settings, otherwise please click "Accept" to proceed.
OPTIONSACCEPT
Manage consent

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Functional
Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features.
Performance
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
Analytics
Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
CookieDurationDescription
_ga2 yearsThis cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site's analytics report. The cookies store information anonymously and assign a randomly generated number to identify unique visitors.
_gat_UA-6619340-11 minuteNo description
_gid1 dayThis cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to store information of how visitors use a website and helps in creating an analytics report of how the wbsite is doing. The data collected including the number visitors, the source where they have come from, and the pages viisted in an anonymous form.
_parsely_session30 minutesThis cookie is used to track the behavior of a user within the current session.
HotJar: _hjAbsoluteSessionInProgress30 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjFirstSeen30 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjid1 yearThis cookie is set by Hotjar. This cookie is set when the customer first lands on a page with the Hotjar script. It is used to persist the random user ID, unique to that site on the browser. This ensures that behavior in subsequent visits to the same site will be attributed to the same user ID.
HotJar: _hjIncludedInPageviewSample2 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjIncludedInSessionSample2 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjTLDTestsessionNo description
SSCVER1 year 24 daysThe domain of this cookie is owned by Nielsen. The cookie is used for online advertising by creating user profile based on their preferences.
Advertisement
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
CookieDurationDescription
_fbp3 monthsThis cookie is set by Facebook to deliver advertisement when they are on Facebook or a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising after visiting this website.
fr3 monthsThe cookie is set by Facebook to show relevant advertisments to the users and measure and improve the advertisements. The cookie also tracks the behavior of the user across the web on sites that have Facebook pixel or Facebook social plugin.
IDE1 year 24 daysUsed by Google DoubleClick and stores information about how the user uses the website and any other advertisement before visiting the website. This is used to present users with ads that are relevant to them according to the user profile.
IMRID1 year 24 daysThe domain of this cookie is owned by Nielsen. The cookie is used for storing the start and end of the user session for nielsen statistics. It helps in consumer profiling for online advertising.
personalization_id2 yearsThis cookie is set by twitter.com. It is used integrate the sharing features of this social media. It also stores information about how the user uses the website for tracking and targeting.
TDID1 yearThe cookie is set by CloudFare service to store a unique ID to identify a returning users device which then is used for targeted advertising.
test_cookie15 minutesThis cookie is set by doubleclick.net. The purpose of the cookie is to determine if the user's browser supports cookies.
Others
Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet.
CookieDurationDescription
adEdition1 dayNo description
akaas_MSNBC10 daysNo description
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional1 yearThe cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others1 yearNo description
geoEdition1 dayNo description
next-i18next1 yearNo description
SAVE & ACCEPT
Powered by CookieYes Logo
Scroll Up