Vice President Harris says she would support eliminating the filibuster within the U.S. Senate with a view to carry again federal protections for a girl's proper to an abortion as they existed below Roe v. Wade.
Harris outlined her place throughout an interview Monday with NPR member station Wisconsin Public Radio, saying that in the case of the problem of abortion, she believes the Senate ought to put off the filibuster rule that requires a 60-vote threshold for most laws to cross.
“I've been very clear, I think we should eliminate the filibuster for Roe, and get us to the point where 51 votes would be what we need to actually put back in law the protections for reproductive freedom and for the ability of every person and every woman to make decisions about their own body and not have their government tell them what to do,” Harris advised WPR host Kate Archer Kent.
Harris' feedback got here as she works to sharpen the excellence between herself and former President Donald Trump on some of the pivotal points going through voters on this 12 months's presidential election. And whereas she has voiced support for ending the filibuster before — together with on the problem of reproductive rights — it is a matter she has not often addressed since President Biden's determination to desert his reelection bid and endorse her as an alternative.
For extra highlights from Harris' interview, head to Wisconsin Public Radio.
Her message may carry specific weight in Wisconsin, a vital battleground state the place nearly no authorized abortions had been carried out for almost 15 months within the aftermath of the Supreme Court's determination in 2022 to strike down Roe.
Harris has blamed Trump for the autumn of Roe, saying as lately as Friday that he's the “architect” of a well being care disaster attributable to the Supreme Court's determination in Roe — a regulation that Trump's three Supreme Court nominees voted to overturn. In the identical speech, she referenced latest reporting from ProPublica about two Georgia girls whose deaths, after implementation of the state's new abortion regulation, had been deemed “preventable” by a state committee of maternal well being specialists.
Trump has sought to push again towards Harris, telling an viewers in Pennsylvania on Monday that “women will be happy, healthy confident and free” if he's elected to a second time period in workplace.
“You will no longer be thinking about abortion, it's all they talk about, abortion, because we've done something that nobody else could have done. It is now where it always had to be, with the states and they [sic] vote of the people,” Trump stated.
Harris on housing and “forever chemicals”
During her interview, Harris was additionally pressed on numerous different points going through Wisconsin voters. On housing, she reiterated her plans to offer $25,000 in down cost help for first-time homebuyers, and stated she would work with the non-public sector and residential builders “to build 3 million new homes by the end of my first term.”
Harris stated she would attain that objective by a mixture of tax credit for builders and eliminating crimson tape within the development course of.
The vp was additionally requested about poisonous chemical compounds often known as PFAs which can be contaminating consuming water round Wisconsin, and whether or not she would press for stricter laws of those chemical compounds.
Harris stated the Biden administration is funding billions in water infrastructure initiatives across the nation to wash up consuming water and substitute lead pipes. Nearly $2 billion of that funding goes to Wisconsin, she stated.
For extra highlights from Harris' interview, head to Wisconsin Public Radio.
