Congressman Dan Goldman Fights to Codify Abortion Access Nationwide

The ‘Women's Health Protection Act’ Aims to Safeguard Against Anti-Abortion Laws Across the Country

Federal Legislation Would Codify Roe V. Wade

Washington D.C. – Congressman Dan Goldman (NY-10) today joined Congresswoman Judy Chu (CA-28) in introducing the Women’s Health Protection Act. First introduced in 2013, the Women’s Health Protection Act establishes a federal right for healthcare professionals to provide abortion care and the right for their patients to receive care, free from bans and medically unnecessary restrictions that single out abortion care. The Women’s Health Protection Act codifies and expands upon the rights established in Roe v. Wade.

“By overturning Roe v. Wade, this extremist Supreme Court ripped away a fundamental right from the first time in history and took control over women’s reproductive rights,” Congressman Dan Goldman said.“Republicans are waging a war on women in State Legislatures across the country. Codifying the federal right to an abortion is long overdue. I am proud to join Rep. Chu in the fight for women’s rights across the United States and will continue to defend the right to reproductive healthcare.”  

Congressman Goldman has been a defender of abortion rights since being sworn into Congress. Earlier this month, Congressman Goldman cosponsored the Ensuring Women's Right to Reproductive Freedom Act. This legislation would prohibit any person acting under state law, including private parties, from punishing Americans traveling for reproductive health care.

During his second month in Congress, Congressman Goldman cosponsored a package of legislation to protect abortion rights, including the Equal Access to Abortion Coverage in Healthcare Act which would repeal the Hyde Amendment and guarantee abortion coverage regardless of health insurance status. 

With the overturning of 50 years of precedent in the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision and without federal protections for reproductive healthcare rights, states have already denied millions of people access to basic healthcare. More than 20 percent of the country’s population currently resides in states where abortion is now illegal. Women are forced to travel long distances, sometimes at risk of facing conservative legal action, to access abortion care or carry pregnancies against their will. A lack of federal abortion access endangers the lives of women throughout the country.

Abortion bans and restrictions also disproportionately impact those who already face discriminatory barriers to accessing health care—including Black, Indigenous, Latina, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, and other people of color, women, those working to make ends meet, members of the LGBTQI+ community, immigrants, young people, those living in rural communities, and people with disabilities.

The protections of the WHPA guarantee a pregnant person’s right to access an abortion—and the right of an abortion provider to deliver these abortion services—free from medically unnecessary restrictions that interfere with a patient’s individual choice or the provider-patient relationship.

Congressman Goldman is a member of the Pro-Choice Caucus in the House of Representatives.

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