Key senators have indicated they will vote no on a Democratic bill to ensure access to contraception, citing concerns about lacking protections for people who oppose contraceptives on religious grounds.
The Right to Contraception Act passed the House Thursday in a 228-195 vote, largely along party lines. The measure would guarantee a right to all Food and Drug Administration-approved contraceptive pills and devices, as well as sterilization procedures. But some Republicans argued that it would strip healthcare providers of their freedom to object to administering birth control or sterilizations on religious or moral grounds.
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The bill text states that “Providers’ refusals to offer contraceptives and information related to contraception based on their own personal beliefs impede patients from obtaining their preferred method.” The legislation also includes language overriding the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, a law that created legal safeguards for religious people and entities with respect to federal rules. RFRA was the key consideration in the landmark 2014 Hobby Lobby Supreme Court case, in which the majority found that the Obamacare contraception mandate violated the law in cases of privately held, for-profit organizations like Hobby Lobby.
The bill, if passed, would override all state and federal religious freedom laws, SBA Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser said, “thereby driving out providers who have deeply held moral or religious beliefs about sterilization and contraceptives.”
It has already alienated some key centrist lawmakers in the Senate.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), who “supports federal protections for contraception access,” according to a statement from her office, doesn’t support the bill and is working on a separate bill with Sens. Tim Kaine (D-VA), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ). The bill, which has yet to be made public, “would codify the right to use contraception first recognized by the Supreme Court in Griswold, while also maintaining protections for religious liberties.” The decision in the 1965 case Griswold v. Connecticut established a right to buy and use contraceptives.
Collins has a record of opposing abortion legislation that does not ensure protections for people who oppose the procedure on a religious basis. She cited an infringement on religious liberties as a reason for voting against Democratic legislation to codify abortion rights, the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would have gone far beyond writing Roe into statute. The bill would have solidified the right to abortion beyond the point of viability, around 24 weeks, overturned all state restrictions on abortion, and sidestepped a defense raised under RFRA.
Collins and Murkowski introduced an alternative to the Women’s Health Protection Act over a concern that it violated RFRA.
“The WHPA explicitly invalidates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in connection with abortion and supersedes other longstanding, bipartisan conscience laws, including provisions in the Affordable Care Act, that protect health care providers who choose not to offer abortion services for moral or religious reasons,” Collins said in May ahead of a doomed vote on the bill in the Senate.
Kaine, who did not respond to a request for comment on his bill, is a Catholic and touted his religious credentials while on the 2016 campaign trail as Hillary Clinton’s running mate. Kaine was an effective messenger on the campaign, appealing to Catholics as well as Christians of different denominations.
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Kaine has a 100% voting score from the abortion rights group NARAL and a 95% from Planned Parenthood. He also has a record of voting against efforts to defund Planned Parenthood and joined fellow Democrats in urging wider coverage of contraception under Obamacare plans. Still, Kaine said, while campaigning with Clinton in 2016, “I’m a traditional Catholic, personally, I’m opposed to abortion.”
