House Democrats are seeking to force a vote on legislation that would guarantee the right to access birth control just days before the Democratic-led Senate is set to take a vote on a similar measure.

What You Need To Know

  • House Democrats are seeking to force a vote on legislation aimed at protecting access to contraception

  • The bill, known as the Right to Contraception Act, would write into federal law the right to access all forms of FDA-approved birth control

  • The action from House Democrats comes as the Senate prepares to vote on similar legislation on Wednesday

  • It's Democrats' latest effort to put reproductive rights at the forefront ahead of November's election

The bill, known as the Right to Contraception Act, would write into federal law the right to access all forms of FDA-approved birth control. The measure aims to protect access to birth control by barring the federal government or states from restricting access to contraception and guaranteeing that “the right to contraception is a fundamental right, central to a person’s privacy, health, wellbeing, dignity, liberty, equality, and ability to participate in the social and economic life of the Nation.”

Two Democrats, Rep. Kathy Manning of North Carolina and House Democratic Whip Rep. Katherine Clark of Massachusetts, filed a discharge petition on Tuesday that seeks to force a vote on the bill. A discharge petition would allow the legislation to come to the floor for a vote without the approval of Republican leadership if it gets the support of the majority of the chamber, so Democrats would need a handful of Republicans to join them in order to force a vote.

Manning first introduced the bill two years ago after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that guaranteed the right to an abortion. In a  concurring opinion to Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization -- the case that overruled Roe -- conservative Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the high court should “reconsider” several key rulings, including Griswold v. Connecticut, a landmark decision which held that Connecticut’s ban on contraceptives violated the right to privacy and protected their use without government interference.

The bill passed when Democrats controlled the House in 2022, but never got a vote in the Senate.

"House Republicans have a choice to make: Sign [Manning's] discharge petition to protect birth control access — Or put your anti-freedom extremism in full view of the American people," Clark wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. 

"Extremist Republican politicians are waging war on women’s reproductive health," Manning said in a statement. "They’ve stripped women of their constitutional right to obtain an abortion, attacked fertility treatments, and are now attempting to restrict access to birth control. The attacks on birth control are another step in extremist Republican politicians’ plot to control women’s bodies."

The petition comes as the Senate prepares to vote on similar legislation on Wednesday. In a letter to colleagues on Sunday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said that the Democratic-led chamber will put "reproductive freedoms front and center" ahead of November's election.

Calling Dobbs "one of the worst Supreme Court decisions of modern times,” Schumer condemned attacks nationwide on abortion rights in the wake of the ruling and pledged that his Democratic conference “will never relent until we reverse the immense damage MAGA Republicans and the Supreme Court have inflicted."

The bill has dozens of Democratic cosponsors in the Senate and more than 200 in the House, but it’s unclear if it can pick up any Republican support in either chamber.

But the vote will allow Democrats the opportunity to put their Republican colleagues on the record on reproductive rights, a key issue heading into November's election that the party is hoping can translate into success at the voting booth. 

"There's no question in the American people's minds that Republicans have brought our country to this point," Schumer wrote in his letter. "And as Donald Trump reminded us recently, he is 'proudly the person responsible' for the annihilation of Roe v. Wade and the grotesque reversal of women's personal freedoms. Democrats have been clear we will not stand for these attacks and we will fight to preserve reproductive freedoms."

Former President Trump, the Republican Party's presumptive nominee in November's election, said last month that he was “looking at” restrictions to birth control, before his campaign sought to walk his comments back.

President Joe Biden's reelection campaign, meanwhile, has launched an advertising blitz aimed at keeping the issue of abortion front and center heading into the election. A focus on abortion rights was credited with giving Democrats a stronger-than-expected showing in the 2022 midterm elections and state referendums on abortion have been successful every time they've been on the ballot, including in deep red states like Ohio and Kansas. Democrats and abortion rights advocates are hopeful that a focus on the issue will help them to flip the House, defend a tough Senate map and impact a close presidential election, particularly with abortion on the ballot in several states.

When the bill was last considered two years ago, Republicans said the bill went too far. They said it would lead to more abortions, which supporters deny, allow the use of drugs not yet fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration and force health care providers to offer contraceptives, even if that contradicted their religious beliefs.

“Women deserve the truth, not more fear and misinformation that forces an extreme agenda on the American people,” Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash, said at the time.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.