Sen. Bernie Sanders is running for the Democratic nomination for president, if you hadn’t heard. On Friday, Sanders, now in a runoff against Joe Biden, went after the former vice president’s evolving relationship with reproductive rights. At a rally in Detroit, Sanders quoted a now infamous statement from then-senator Biden in 1973 about the 1970 Roe v. Wade landmark decision granting women the right to choose whether or not she might have an abortion without government restrictions. “I don’t like the Supreme Court Decision on abortion. I think it went too far. I don’t think that a woman has the sole right to say what should happen to her body,” Sanders told the crowd.
The following day, Sanders’ campaign released a policy directed at women’s health care and justice, titled “Reproductive Health Care and Justice for All.” The policy plan begins with Sanders saying he would work to get the Hyde Amendment, the awful policy that blocks any federal funding to be used at all for abortion services, repealed. This is not a new stance from Sanders, who has promised the same result as a part of Medicare for All policy. But articulating one’s self on women’s reproductive rights is essential for any Democratic candidate to be in.