The new rule would cover emergency contraceptives like Plan B, condoms, spermicides and nonprescription birth control pills.
If approved, the rule would make birth control available to an additional 52 million women of reproductive age with private health insurance, according to the White House.
“At a time when contraception access is under attack, Vice President Harris and I are resolute in our commitment to expanding access to quality, affordable contraception,” President Biden said in a statement Monday.
“We believe that women in every state must have the freedom to make deeply personal health care decisions, including the right to decide if and when to start or grow their family,” he added.
Harris has made protecting reproductive rights a central theme of her presidential run against former President Trump. She has warned repeatedly throughout her campaign that if Trump is elected again, Republican lawmakers would seek to further restrict Americans’ reproductive rights.
Harris used GOP lawmakers’ efforts to block legislation protecting the right to contraception and in vitro fertilization (IVF) as examples of how Republican lawmakers are “attacking reproductive freedom.”
Trump appointed three conservative Supreme Court justices during his presidency who helped overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark court decision protecting the right to an abortion, in 2022. He has repeatedly taken credit for the ruling’s overturning but has said in the past that he would veto any national abortion ban.
Instead, he has argued that abortion access should be left up to states.
