FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 21, 2021
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Attorney General Steve Marshall Calls on Congress to Restore Hyde Amendment to Prohibit Taxpayer Funding of Abortions
(MONTGOMERY) – Attorney General Steve Marshall is leading a coalition of 22 state attorneys general asking Congress to keep an amendment prohibiting taxpayer funding of abortions in the federal budget after it was conspicuously removed by the Biden Administration.
In his letter sent to Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday, Attorney General Marshall called on Congress to resist the president’s efforts to force taxpayers who object to abortions to pay for them.
“The Hyde Amendment was first enacted in 1976 following the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade, and has been reenacted every year since with broad bipartisan support,” Attorney General Marshall wrote. “The key to the Hyde Amendment’s four-and-a-half-decades longevity is that its purpose is clear and commonsensical: it prohibits the use of federal funds for abortions (with exceptions), on the basis that a great many taxpayers object to abortion on moral or religious grounds and, therefore, it is unconscionable to force them to pay for abortions by using their tax dollars for that purpose. Congress should resist following President Biden down this path and should instead maintain the Hyde Amendment language in the budget it ultimately passes.”
“Nearly sixty percent of Americans oppose taxpayer funding of abortion, including ‘a majority of independents’ and even ‘a notable proportion of Democrats.’ President Biden previously professed to share this conviction, assuring the public that he was guided by the ‘principle’ that ‘those of us who are opposed to abortion should not be compelled to pay for them’ and touting that he ‘ha[d] conistently – on no fewer than 50 occasions – voted against federal funding of abortions.’ Seeking the Democratic nomination for president, candidate Biden again affirmed his support for the Hyde Amendment. But then – forty-eight hours later – he reversed himself and denounced the Hyde Amendment after facing criticism from a small but extreme minority of the American populace: pro-abortion activists.”
“Unborn life might be nothing more than a matter of politics for the administration, but it is something quite different for us: the policy in question is one of life or death,” Attorney General Marshall continued. “Studies of the Hyde Amendment have found that it has saved the lives of millions of unborn children – saving 2.13 million lives in its first forty years alone, and saving over 60,000 lives per year today.”
Attorneys General Marshall was joined by his colleagues from Alaska, Arizona,
Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi,
Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota,
Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia in signing the letter to Congress.
Read Attorney General Marshall’s letter here.
[To access link, click PDF icon at upper right of press release]
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