United States: Joe Biden defender of abortion, a bet for the Democrats in the mid-terms?
U.S. President Joe Biden speaks to the media before boarding Air Force One for a trip to Alabama, Tuesday, May 3, 2022, at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland.
© AP - Evan Vucci
Text by: RFI Follow
2 mins
In the United States, it is an important election year: the midterm elections.
They will see in the fall the partial renewal of the Congress.
The campaign has just been turned upside down by the revelations of the information site Politico on the right to abortion, threatened by the Supreme Court.
US President Joe Biden now takes on the role of the first defender of the right to abortion.
Which is not so obvious for this fervent Catholic.
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A leaked internal document shows that a majority of judges would be on the verge of questioning the Court's judgment which guarantees this right at the federal level.
In a country very divided on abortion, the Democratic Party hopes that this pavement in the fed up will make it possible to mobilize its rows before the elections.
US President Joe Biden now takes on the role of the first defender of the right to abortion.
Which is not necessarily obvious for this fervent Catholic.
In his long career as a senator, he has not always been a fierce proponent of abortion rights.
His opinion has timidly evolved.
Until recently, he preferred to speak of “
women's right to choose
”, rather than using the word abortion.
►Also read
: Abortion in the United States: Biden as a bulwark against the conservative offensive at the Supreme Court
Since yesterday, it's a change of gear.
The word is spoken: access to abortion, he says, is a fundamental right.
Joe Biden, who is in a fragile position, with an popularity rate around 40%, may find here the perfect political opportunity to get back in the saddle, just six months before the elections where his party could lose the majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives.
A risky bet
Activists, however, question its sincerity: the right to abortion has only held for 50 years to a case law of the Supreme Court.
Why didn't he fight earlier to enshrine it once and for all in federal law?
And then, it's a risky bet because abortion is a very divisive subject, which also mobilizes in the opposing camp.
This is, moreover, "the" success of Donald Trump: having managed to appoint three of the nine judges of the Supreme Court, judges known for their anti-abortion positions, and who have effectively tipped the balance of the highest American jurisdiction.
For his part, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has launched an appeal in favor of the right to abortion.
“
Restricting access to abortion does not reduce the number of procedures – it leads women and girls to resort to unsafe procedures.
Access to safe abortion saves lives
, ”he said on his Twitter account, without directly mentioning the affair which has shaken the United States since Monday.
Women should always have the right to choose when it comes to their bodies and their health.
Restricting access to #abortion does not reduce the number of procedures — it drives women and girls towards unsafe ones.
Access to safe abortion saves lives.
https://t.co/SdF81B5D1u
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) May 4, 2022
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United States
Womens rights
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Joe Biden