MILLERSVILLE — The Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago, “drawn new blood from wounds that had already healed,” first lady Jill Biden said Sunday at a Women for Biden-Harris event in Lancaster County.
“We are still fighting battles that were decided decades ago,” Biden said during brief remarks at Millersville University. “We are the first generation to give our daughters fewer rights than we ourselves. Radical Republicans are sacrificing women’s health, freedom and future in the name of their political agenda and that is why we are here today.”
The first lady once again placed the blame for the overturning of the Wade case on former President Donald Trump, who appointed three conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices who voted in Dobbs’ favor. She said that if President Joe Biden is re-elected, he will strengthen access to reproductive health care and fight for a national law that restores Roe protections, including access to in vitro fertilization and access to contraception.
Biden told the story of her high school friend who became pregnant as a teenager and, before the doctor decided to terminate the pregnancy, had to undergo a psychiatric evaluation, finding that she was mentally incapable of working. Biden said her friend was unable to return home after the abortion. She asked her mother if her friend could stay with them.
“And my mom didn’t hesitate,” Biden said. She and her mother never talked about it afterward, and her mother never told anyone.
“Secrecy, shame, silence, danger, even death: that is what has defined this time for so many women,” Biden said. “And we are shamed again by this silence, 50 years later we are still fighting battles that were decided many decades ago.
Biden was introduced by Lancaster OB-GYN Dr. Sharee Livingston, who told the Capital-Star she saw firsthand the consequences of overturning Roe v. Wade. “Every day I talk to patients who are afraid,” Richardson said. “I am here to push for legislation to improve care for all women giving birth, especially marginalized women.”
Trump, who campaigned in Philadelphia on Saturday he boasted about his candidates for the Supreme Court, but it happened presented contradictory positions on abortion in 2024. Before arriving in Philadelphia, Trump spoke at the Road to a Majority 2024 conference organized by the conservative Christian Faith and Freedom coalition in Washington, D.C., and reiterated his position that abortion regulations should be left to the states.
Trump says abortion policy should be left to the states
“People will decide and that’s how it should be.” – Trump said on Saturday in Washington. He has previously said he supports exceptions to abortion bans in cases of rape, incest and the life of the pregnant patient, and earlier during the campaign he announced he would support a 16-week nationwide ban.
The first lady said Sunday that Trump underestimated women’s power – and their anger – over the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
“He sees us working late shifts and making shopping lists and going to football training and volunteering and caring for parents and raising money for people in need, and he thinks it’s OK to ignore us,” she said, drawing boos from the audience. “He doesn’t know that when our bodies are at stake, when our daughter’s future is at stake, we are unmoveable and unstoppable.”
Latest polls has Trump with a slight lead over Biden in Pennsylvania. The latest poll from Emerson College shows that Trump leads 51% to 49% in the head-to-head matchup between Trump and Biden. After including potential third-party candidates Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Jill Stein and Cornel West, the Emerson poll showed Trump’s lead over Biden increased from 45% to 42%, with Kennedy gaining 5%.
Kennedy provided the required signatures will appear on the Pennsylvania ballot overdue last week, but will likely face challenges before the August deadline.
In the 2020 election, Biden defeated Trump by just over 80,000 votes in Pennsylvania. But Trump won Lancaster County in this election, 57% to Biden’s 41%. Trump’s margin of victory in Lancaster County was even higher in 2016, when defeat Hillary Clinton 57% to 38%
The Lancaster County rally was one of several stops the first lady made in Pennsylvania on Sunday. She frequently visited the state during the campaign, and recently made a surprise appearance at the stadium Pittsburgh Pride Day on June 1and delivering the keynote address at Erie County Community College’s commencement the same day.
