A new poll found that nearly two-thirds of the country want the abortion pill mifepristone to remain available amid a fierce debate over abortion taking place across the country.
The Supreme Court issued a temporary stay on Friday to keep the nation’s most popular abortion drug in use after a Texas judge ruled it should not have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
The ruling sparked a firestorm of criticism and legal appeals with fears that Texas judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Donald Trump appointee, would end the FDA’s authority over the country’s medical supplies and have wider ramifications. for other drugs.
But Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who is a doctor, pushed that back, saying it was “totally alarming.”
“It’s utterly alarming,” he said on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday. “I find that alarming and I also think that the FDA should not be above the law.”
Meanwhile, 67 percent of the CBS News poll released Sunday said mifepristone should remain available to people in states where abortion is legal, while 33 percent said it shouldn’t.
Republicans are more divided on the issue: 46 percent say the abortion drug should be available, while 54 percent say it shouldn’t be available.
The poll of 2,065 US adults, conducted between April 12 and April 14, has a margin of error of 3.2 percentage points.
The CBS survey was conducted after Kacsmaryk ruled that mifepristone was improperly approved by the FDA more than 20 years ago.
President Joe Biden’s Justice Department appealed the decision to the 5th Circuit, which allowed the drug to be used but shortened the period of pregnancy in which it can be taken and said it could not be delivered by mail.
That ruling was appealed to the Supreme Court, as many saw the ruling as significantly restricting access to abortion.
On Friday, Judge Samuel Alito placed a five-day pause in the fast-moving case to allow judges to decide whether lower court rulings limiting FDA approval of mifepristone should take effect soon.
The high courts are currently being asked only to determine which parts of Kacsmaryk’s April 7 ruling – as amended by the 5th Circuit – can stand as the case moves through the court system.
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a surprise appearance at the March for Reproductive Rights in Los Angeles on Saturday
Alito’s order expires late Wednesday, suggesting the Supreme Court will rule on the matter by then.
This means the court is taking on another fight against abortion less than a year after conservative justices overturned Roe v. Wade.
Democratic lawmakers on Sunday criticized the Texas judge’s abortion ruling.
“For me, this is incredible. This is a drug that has been on the market for more than 20 years. FDA is doing a thorough investigation, finds it safe,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“One Amarillo Texas judge, two 5th circuit judges, all Trump-appointed, should not be making the decision for women across the country.”
The White House, meanwhile, is working to counter the many abortion restrictions put in place by the states and courts after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Abortion rights are expected to be one of the dominant issues in the 2024 presidential election.
Vice President Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance at an abortion rights rally in Los Angeles on Saturday, where she called on Americans to take action.
“This is a moment when history will show that each of us – based on our collective love for our country – must stand up, fight for and protect our ideals. That’s what this moment is,” Harris said. “If you attack women’s rights in America, you attack America.”
Mifepristone blocks the hormone progesterone in the body and is used together with the drug misoprostol to terminate pregnancy within the first 10 weeks.
More than half of abortions in the US are now drug-induced abortions, and the vast majority of those include that two-drug protocol.
Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who is a physician, pushed back fears about FDA autonomy when he was on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday
Mifepristone was originally approved by the FDA for use in 2000
The FDA approved the use of mifepristone in 2000, but the plaintiffs in the Texas case argued that the FDA had not sufficiently assessed mifepristone’s safety.
Medical groups point out that mifepristone has been used by millions of women over the past 23 years with a low complication rate.
Common side effects of mifepristone include cramping, bleeding, nausea, headache, and diarrhea. In rare cases, women may experience excessive bleeding that requires surgery to stop.
According to the FDA, by June 2022, more than 5.6 million women in the US had taken the drug. During that time, the agency received 4,200 reports of complications in women, or less than one-tenth of 1% of women taking the drug.