[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 45 (Thursday, March 9, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Page S730]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                     Women's Health Protection Act

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, yesterday, I joined Leader Schumer, 
Senators Baldwin, Blumenthal, and Murray and a number of my colleagues 
in introducing a piece of legislation that is urgently needed. It is 
entitled the Women's Health Protection Act of 2023.
  This bill would protect the right to obtain and provide reproductive 
healthcare--as basic as anything in America--as well as the freedom of 
Americans to seek this care free of medically unnecessary restrictions 
or limitations as to where a patient can receive it.
  It has been about 9 months since the Thomas-Alito Court ripped away 
this fundamental right in America and put a target on the backs of 
women and healthcare providers across the country. Since then, we have 
heard one horror story after another--stories of rape victims as young 
as 10 years old who have been forced to travel across State lines to 
receive critical healthcare, stories of women who were suffering 
miscarriages but still have been denied care by doctors in red States 
where the doctors are afraid of being charged with a crime, stories of 
women who have been abandoned by their State's leaders, many of whom 
have found refuge in the State of Illinois.
  Despite these stories of girls and women who have been denied 
critical healthcare because of partisan politics, Republicans are 
continuing to push dangerous abortion bans and restrictions. These 
politicians think they know better than the women who are affected by 
these decisions and their doctors.
  Beware of the moment when legislators start playing doctor. They are 
doing it all across America on this issue. They are wrong.
  We need to respect the freedom and right of women and the expertise 
of their medical professionals, period, and we need to recognize that 
politicians have no business in the hospital room or in the doctor's 
office. There should be a matter of privacy and respect that should be 
guiding our policy.
  If we want to defend freedom and fundamental rights in America, we 
need to pass the Women's Health Protection Act.
  The debate has even gone so far as to affect the corner drugstore.
  This week, I was on the phone with the CEO of Walgreens, an Illinois-
based company, one of the largest pharmacy companies in the United 
States of America. They are torn currently by an announcement of policy 
earlier this week which generated a lot of controversy: whether or not 
they will dispense medications which are used to end a pregnancy.
  I begged them to at least wait until this issue has become clearer in 
the courts before taking a corporate position. The other major pharmacy 
chains are making the same decision themselves. We will find out what 
they conclude.
  But it is an indication that this debate has gone far beyond the 
floor of the U.S. Senate in Washington--it is on your street corner; it 
is in your mall; it is in the shopping center that you have been going 
to all your life--as to whether or not you can have access to a drug 
that was judged safe and effective 20 years ago by the Federal 
Government.
  That is what happens when legislators decide to be doctors.