Joe Biden, the current front-runner in the Democratic presidential primary, said he supports repealing the Hyde Amendment a day after his campaign said he supported it.
“I’ve supported the Hyde Amendment like many, many others have because there was sufficient monies and circumstances where women were able to exercise that right,” the former vice president said Thursday in regards to the amendment, which bans federal money from being used to fund abortions. “But circumstances have changed. I’ve been working through the final details of my healthcare plan like others in this race and I’ve been struggling with the problems that Hyde now presents.”
“I can’t justify leaving millions of women without access to care they need and the ability to constitute, exercise their constitutionally protected right. If I believe healthcare is a right, as I do, I can no longer support an amendment that makes that right dependent on someone’s ZIP code,” he said.
Biden received blowback from fellow Democrats after his campaign signaled that he still supported the amendment.
The Delaware Democrat has gone back and forth in his support for the amendment, telling an ACLU volunteer last month that he supported repealing the amendment.
His campaign claimed that the former vice president has never changed his position on repealing the Hyde amendment and that he would be willing to repeal if Roe v. Wade was at risk of being repealed.
Biden is currently leading the field of two dozen Democrats running for president, with 33.5% support in the polls according to RealClearPolitics.
