President Biden Speaks After Supreme Court Overturns Roe V. Wade (Video)

President Biden is addressing the nation hours after the Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, as his administration determines how to move forward now that the Supreme Court has decided there is no constitutional right to an abortion.

"Today is a — it's not hyperbole, it's just a very solemn moment," Mr. Biden said Friday. "Today, the Supreme Court of the United States expressly took away a constitutional right from the American people that it had already recognized. They didn't limit it. They simply took away."

Mr. Biden had already expressed his disapproval of overturning Roe when a draft of the opinion leaked in May.

"It concerns me a great deal that, after 50 years, we're going to decide that a woman doesn't have the right to choose," the president said at the time. "But even more equally profound is the rationale used -- and it would mean that every other decision relating to the notion of privacy is thrown into question."

The Supreme Court on Friday overturned the decision in Roe v. Wade that established the right to an abortion, a move that now gives states the authority to impose their own restrictions on abortion. Thirteen states have so-called "trigger laws" on the books, in which abortion will swiftly be outlawed in most cases given that Roe is now overturned.

Democrats immediately lamented the decision. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the rights of women and all Americans "are on the ballot this November," and warned what could happen if Republicans take control of Congress, and called the decision a slap in the face to women.

Former President Barack Obama said Friday that the Supreme Court "relegated the most intensely personal decision someone can make to the whims of politicians and ideologues."


Exactly what the Biden administration can do moving forward is not yet clear. On Friday, Senator Joe Manchin called for Congress to codify the rights previously provided under Roe.