Senate Blocks Blunt’s Repeal of Contraception Mandate
Published at
Hemera/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) — The Senate voted Thursday to block a Republican challenge to President Obama’s birth-control mandate. The legislation, sponsored by Republican Roy Blunt of Missouri, was voted down 51 to 48. It would have let employers refuse to include contraception in health care coverage based on their “religious belief or moral conviction.”
Blunt’s legislation, an amendment to a transportation bill, was a response to Obama’s mandate that contraception services be covered by most religious groups.
The amendment wasn’t expected to pass. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said he had allowed the vote because Republicans wouldn’t let the transportation bill advance without a vote on the contraception measure. Democrats characterized the Blunt amendment as a measure that would deny women access to contraception.
Before the vote, Blunt spoke on the floor of the Senate to argue that his proposal wouldn’t change “the world that we live in right now.” He said, “People have the same protection today to exert their religious views in their health care policies that they provide as an employer that they would have if this amendment passed.
“It may not change any minds today, but this issue will not go away unless the administration decides to take it away by giving people of faith these First Amendment protections,” he said.
The White House opposed the measure in a statement from Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who said that it would “allow employers that have no religious affiliation to exclude coverage of any health service, no matter how important, in the health plan they offer to their workers.”
Obama drew criticism from conservatives last month after announcing his birth-control mandate, although he later allowed faith-based employers to opt out of the rule, winning over some Catholics.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio