http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0710-11.htm

Published on Thursday, July 10, 2003 by the Agence France Presse

US Senate Votes to Repeal Bush's Family Planning 'Global Gag Rule'


In a major blow to President George W. Bush's foreign aid policy, the
US Senate voted to repeal his ban on assistance to international
family planning groups that fight for the availability of abortion.

By a vote of 53-43, senators rejected a motion to kill an amendment by
Democrat Barbara Boxer of California that strikes down the so-called
Mexico City Policy, an anti-abortion measure reaffirmed by Bush on his
second day in office.

The Boxer amendment, which has thus been allowed to stand, is attached
to a 27-billion-dollar State Department foreign aid bill being debated
by the chamber.

The Mexico City Policy, often referred to as "the global gag rule,"
bars the US government from providing assistance to organizations that
advocate abortion as one of family planning tools and openly counsel
women about abortion services.

"These organizations face two choices, they can either refuse US
assistance or give up the right to speak freely," an elated Boxer said
in a statement.

She said "the global gag rule" would be unconstitutional if it applied
to family planning groups in the United States.

"How can we export a policy that denies free speech and still say we
support democracy?" the lawmaker asked.

The Mexico City Policy has a tortuous history fraught with raw emotion
and heated debate.

First announced by president Ronald Reagan at a 1984 UN conference on
population held in the Mexican capital, it set strict guidelines for
providing US financial support to foreign family planning agencies,
limiting it only to those that do not promote abortion as a method of
birth control.

Faced with an outcry around the world, president Bill Clinton
rescinded Reagan's executive order in 1993 -- only to draw
condemnation from religious and conservative groups.

Bush, eager to shore up his conservative political base, reinstated
the funding ban on January 22, 2001, in a memorandum sent to the head
of the US Agency for International Development.

"It is my conviction that taxpayer funds should not be used to pay for
abortions or advocate or actively promote abortion, either here or
abroad," the president said in that document.

But even after the Senate vote, the tug-of-war over population control
was expected to continue.

The bill is facing an uphill battle in the Republican-controlled House
of Representatives.

And the White House Office of Management and Budget warned earlier
Wednesday that the administration would "strongly oppose" any
amendment that would allow the government to fund abortion advocacy.

"The president would veto the bill if it were presented to him with
such a provision," the OMB said in a terse statement.

But women's and abortion rights group hailed the Senate move as a
crucial victory for all those who support a woman's right to choose.

"The Bush administration's global gag rule has made family-planning
services -- which reduce the need for abortion -- harder for the
world's poorest women to access," said Kate Michelman, president of
NARAL Pro-Choice America.

Population Connection President Peter Kostmayer said he believed the
White House policy also violated the First Amendment to the US
Constitution, which guarantees free speech.

"Even if you are against abortion, the fact that we have been
dictating reproductive health policies for women in developing
countries, without regard to their laws or customs, should demonstrate
just how wrong this policy was," he said.

The bill also has a provision restoring 50 million dollars in funding
to the United Nations Population Fund over a two-year period,
according to officials.

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Back to the drawing board for Bush and his neanderthal gang.

Harry