Underscoring Election Stakes, Biden Admin Moves to Require Coverage of OTC Birth Control

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential candidate, suggested Monday that the Biden administration's newly proposed rule to expand access to over-the-counter birth control is the latest policy that underscores the stakes for reproductive justice in the 2024 election.

"While we fight to protect and expand healthcare, extremist so-called leaders are attacking reproductive freedom at every turn," said Harris.

The vice president was referring to a new rule under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) proposed by the administration to require insurers to cover all over-the-counter birth control, including the nonprescription birth control pill approved last year, emergency contraception, condoms, and spermicides.

The ACA requires health plans to cover contraception without copayments for patients, but the rule only applies to prescription birth control.

After the Food and Drug Administration approved Opill, a nonprescription birth control pill, last year, reproductive rights advocates and Democrats in Congress called on the Biden administration to make sure the pill would "meet its potential and be truly accessible."

"Federal departments must ensure that it is covered without cost-sharing and without the need for a prescription as a condition of coverage," said 48 Senate Democrats in a letter.

The Biden administration said that if the rule is finalized, it would expand access to 52 million women of reproductive age who have private health insurance.

"We should not forget that Republicans have consistently sought to undermine access to contraception and far-right extremists have even sought to limit access or even ban basic forms of contraception—this threat to our healthcare is real and serious."

"Birth control—and any kind of contraception—is just basic healthcare, and it should be covered and easy to get," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who authored the Affordability Is Access Act to require insurers to fully cover over-the-counter birth control. "Women in America should not have to jump through hoops to make sure insurance is covering their basic reproductive healthcare needs."

"We should not forget that Republicans have consistently sought to undermine access to contraception and far-right extremists have even sought to limit access or even ban basic forms of contraception—this threat to our healthcare is real and serious," added Murray. "While Republicans continue to attack standard and necessary forms of healthcare, Democrats will continue to fight to expand access to contraception and lower healthcare costs for everyone."

When Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022 by the right-wing majority on the U.S. Supreme Court—stacked with justices appointed by former President Donald Trump, now the Republican presidential nominee—Justice Clarence Thomas said the court's finding that the "right to privacy" did not extend to abortion care could also be used to overturn a 1965 case that affirmed married couples had a right to use contraception.

Senate Republicans earlier this year blocked consideration of the Right to Contraception Act, and Trump has suggested he supports restrictions on birth control.

"As Trump and his radical Republican allies restrict women's reproductive healthcare, today's action by the Biden-Harris administration shows there is a different path: expanded access and lower costs for women's healthcare," said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) Monday. "I'm all in on the effort to ensure Americans across the country can get the reproductive healthcare they need without worrying about cost or prosecution by ideological crusaders."