May 20, 2024

Duckworth: Far From “Protecting IVF,” New Senate Republican Effort Would Simply Encourage States to Defund Healthcare for Millions

 

[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – Today, U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) issued the following statement underscoring that a new bill unveiled by U.S. Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Katie Britt (R-AL), which they claim would “protect IVF,” would actually incentivize state legislatures to both ban IVF and defund Medicaid at the same time—unpopular, extreme policies that far-right Republican policymakers have sought to do for decades. This Republican-led effort comes after Republicans blocked Senator Duckworth’s Access to Family Building Act, which would establish a statutory right for patients to receive IVF, for doctors to provide IVF and for insurance providers to cover IVF.

“Incentivizing far-right, anti-choice policymakers in deep red states to defund healthcare for low-income Americans isn't going to stop them from also banning IVF—they’ve wanted to rip healthcare access away from the millions who need it for decades anyway. Americans will not be fooled by this transparently counterproductive effort. The best way to protect access to IVF nationwide is by passing my Access to Family Building Act, which Senate Republicans keep blocking.”

Senators Cruz and Britt’s legislation also calls into question what might be considered a state IVF ban and thereby lead to the state being denied federal Medicaid funding. As we saw recently in Alabama, the state never actually banned IVF but merely affirmed that the purposeful disposal of embryos is—according to Republicans in Alabama—murdering a human child and that doctors and women must receive immunity from criminal and civil liability to undergo IVF procedures and treatments. That is not the reproductive freedom that all families deserve. And yet, as proposed, Cruz and Britt’s legislation would not do anything to solve this issue in Alabama or address so-called “embryonic personhood” bills, which effectively ban IVF, or any other way states might undermine IVF without explicitly banning it.

Throughout her time in the Senate, Duckworth has made protecting reproductive freedom and expanding access to IVF top priorities in the face of Republicans’ anti-choice crusade. Duckworth is the author of the Access to Family Building Act and, in February, she led a group of Senate Democrats in calling for the bill’s passage through unanimous consent, only for Republican U.S. Senator of Mississippi Cindy Hyde-Smith to object and block Duckworth’s effort. This was the second time Senate Republicans blocked Duckworth-led legislation that would protect access to IVF nationwide. The Access to Family Building Act builds on previous legislation she introduced in 2022.

Duckworth was the first Senator to give birth while serving in office and had both of her children with the help of IVF. In 2018 she advocated for the Senate to change its rules so she could bring her infant onto the Senate floor.

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