WASHINGTON – In a move that cements his standing as an absolutist pro-abortion president, today’s Fiscal Year 2022 budget proposal by the Biden White House stripped out any Hyde Amendment provisions.
Eliminating the Hyde Amendment destroys over 40 years of previously unprecedented bipartisan support for a measure aimed at saving human lives.
“By eliminating the Hyde Amendment from his proposed budget, President Biden has once again shown his allegiance to the extremism of pro-abortion groups and their allies,” said Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life.
Tobias continued, “This budget proposal is a scorched earth campaign by pro-abortion Democrats who are marching hand in hand with the most extreme demands of the abortion industry to eliminate all limitations on abortion as well as require taxpayer funding of abortion.”
“The Hyde Amendment has proven to be the greatest domestic abortion-reduction measure ever enacted by Congress,” said Jennifer Popik, J.D., legislative director of National Right to Life. “The Hyde Amendment is widely recognized as having saved over two million American lives since it was first adopted in 1976.”
Popik continued, “The Hyde Amendment’s life-affirming impact cannot be overstated.”
After Biden had supported the Hyde Amendment for decades, last summer, the press recorded then-candidate Biden’s infamous flip-flop.
The truth about the Hyde Amendment and taxpayer funding of abortion:
- The Hyde Amendment has been renewed each appropriations cycle—with few changes—every year for nearly 40 years.
- The amendment has enjoyed bipartisan support over the years and has been supported by Congresses controlled by both parties as well as presidents from both parties.
- It was estimated that before the Hyde Amendment took effect, approximately 300,000 abortions were paid for by Medicaid programs.
- A 2019 Politico/Morning Consult poll found that 49% supported the Hyde Amendment while only 33% opposed it.
- In 2020, a Marist poll found that those opposed to federal funding of abortions held firm with 60% of Americans opposed.
- In a 2021 Marist poll conducted in January, those who “oppose using tax dollars to pay for a woman’s abortion”—58% —is solid and consistent with prior polling. What is noticeable is that 65% of Independents and even 31% of Democrats oppose federal funding of abortion.