Motion to Instruct Conferees on H.R. National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024

Floor Speech

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Ms. HOULAHAN. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today because this House has a choice. We can either stand up for the rights of servicemembers and military families or we can allow the Republican-led House, and specifically the extreme faction of the Republican Conference, to continue their assault on reproductive freedoms.

For my Democratic colleagues and I, this choice is clear. We will fight. We will fight for the freedom of servicewomen and for their families, and I urge my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to please do the same.

Many of our servicemembers joined the Armed Forces prior to the overturning of Roe v. Wade last June, and they did so with the understanding that they and their families would be treated with dignity and would receive comprehensive and high-quality healthcare services, regardless of where they were stationed--and, yes, that also includes access to abortion care.

Since Roe was overturned, servicemembers and their families have had access to travel and to leave if they need to seek reproductive healthcare, but unfortunately, that freedom is now being threatened today.

Mr. Speaker, today, for the very first time since 1973, 14 States have passed outright abortion bans. Seven more have passed partial bans, and six more have tried but have been stopped by the courts.

Nearly 120,000 servicemembers are currently stationed in Texas. This is a State that has implemented a draconian anti-choice law and now has among the worst maternal health outcomes for women in the entire Nation. Our servicewomen deserve better.

This issue has been politicized, and it has been distorted. Outright lies have been spread by elected officials and by anti-abortion activists alike.

I will set the record straight. Here are the facts: Women in States with abortion bans are nearly three times more likely to die during pregnancy, during childbirth, or soon after giving birth. Let that sink in. We are stationing our women in uniform and their families in States where they are three times more likely to die during pregnancy.

No servicemember should have to accept a reality where they could literally die as a result of the anti-choice State law where they are stationed.

These are the conditions that our servicewomen and their military families have to consider when they decide to serve. Nearly half of servicemembers no longer have access to abortion care, and that is not counting even the members of their families, as well.

Our servicemembers signed up to serve our country with the understanding that one day they may have to make the ultimate sacrifice, the sacrifice of their life.

Let me remind the Chamber and those who are watching that we have an all-volunteer force. Again, I will repeat: We have an all-volunteer force.

As we look to recruit and retain the best fighters and the greatest minds that this Nation has to offer, we really cannot restrict the very freedoms that we ask women and men in uniform to potentially die for.

It is also important, as we talk, to go beyond the facts and figures and to share the personal and human impact of these anti-abortion laws and the choices we are facing here this week in this body.

In Texas, the second-largest State for Active-Duty servicemembers in our country, Amanda Zurawski was 18 weeks pregnant when her water broke, putting her at a high risk for developing a life-threatening infection. Doctors told Amanda that her life was in danger and that the fetus was going to die, but doctors could not provide the medical care that she needed because their hands were tied by Texas law.

Amanda eventually did develop sepsis and did eventually nearly die. Heartbreakingly, her ability to be and get pregnant in the future might be damaged, as well.

Amanda survived, and she survived to share this story about her harrowing experience to hopefully prevent others from having this experience, as well.

This story and the data that we have talked about today is why I am working with my colleagues, led by my dear friend and fellow veteran, Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill, to try to codify this basic travel policy.

This body decided that women cannot be trusted to make their own reproductive healthcare choices, and instead, the majority in this House has decided to make it harder for servicewomen and their families to access care; to make it harder for them to make their own healthcare choices; to make it harder for servicewomen and military families to decide on their own if, when, and how to start their own families.

Also, a single United States Senator is holding up more than 300 military promotions and counting, hollowing out the military leadership and hurting our military readiness in the process. He is doing this all because he is that adamant that women in uniform cannot be trusted.

As a veteran myself, let me say out loud and clear that his actions are a disgrace, and Americans agree.

Again, more data: 70 percent of our constituents believe that women should have access to abortion care.

Mr. Speaker, the grave concerns I have outlined don't even begin to scratch the surface of all the harmful amendments that are also tacked on to this bill. Quite frankly, it is an embarrassment to this institution that our governance is just so fractured, so unable to agree on something so simple as letting a woman in uniform make the best care decisions for her family, her career, and herself.

Sadly, this is indicative of where we are today. I grew up in a military family, and I myself served. My parents didn't always agree on politics, but they shared a common love for the promises that this Nation offered my father, a refugee and Holocaust survivor who became a Navy aviator.

I have colleagues on the other side of this aisle with whom I work and respect, which is why I am deeply saddened to see a bipartisan bill that has endured for 60 years fall victim to this kind of partisan politics because the bipartisan bill that we passed originally out of committee by 58-1 is literally no longer recognizable.

Today, Mr. Speaker, is about choice, choice in more ways than one. We can either let this far-right minority continue to hold our national security hostage to their radical agenda, or we can refuse to allow them to play politics with our national security and with the health and well-being of our servicemembers.

Just before I introduce our next person, I want to emphasize that this is not a new policy. The DOD is not simply creating a new policy out of thin air. The DOD is, in fact, using precedent from the nonavailability of care and simply allowing women with reproductive health service needs to be able to have effective travel and reimbursement for said travel. Again, this is not a new policy, and it simply updates a policy that allows for travel reimbursement to ensure that we have equal access to healthcare.

Thankfully, we have a President in Joe Biden who is responsive to the needs of our military servicemembers and who supports this effort.

McCollum).

Here are the facts: Not a single dollar is going toward paying for an abortion under the current DOD travel policy, which only provides for leave and travel reimbursements for servicewomen who are forced to travel for their healthcare due to restrictive laws of the State that they are stationed in, in line with a very longstanding DOD policy that has always provided for travel and leave where specialized healthcare is not provided or allowed for.

Slotkin).

We don't get to choose what our facts are. The chilling effect that is happening right now on recruiting is caused by a variety of things, but the number one reason, the number one contributing factor to a servicemember's decision to enlist or reenlist, is the support of their spouse.

If we are showing the entire country that we don't trust women and families to be in control of their own healthcare decisions, why would they encourage anyone in their family to reenlist or to enlist in the service at all.
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Ms. HOULAHAN. Pelosi), former Speaker of the House.
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Ms. HOULAHAN. Mr. Speaker, just a reminder that President Biden knows personally what it means to support those in uniform and to keep the administration's promise to make sure that our servicemen and -women are protected as they serve us all.

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Ms. HOULAHAN. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining.

I would like very much, Mr. Speaker, if I could ask you to ask my colleagues to not presume to judge who I am.

I stand here as a woman who has worn the uniform, who has given birth while wearing the uniform. To have assumptions about who I am or what I am and to judge me or any of my other colleagues who have worn the uniform is an offense to me, and I would ask that you advise them not to presume anything about me.

Mr. Speaker, a far-right minority in Congress has spent the last 9 months holding this process, this NDAA, hostage--again, a reminder that this passed with overwhelming bipartisan support. They are currently struggling to even pass a rule for Defense appropriations, let alone to pass the budget itself.

They have gone through attacks on servicewomen, on LGBTQ servicemembers, on immigrant servicemembers, and so much more. Their allies in the Senate are risking our military readiness with asinine confirmation holds and ignoring the repeated requests of our most senior military members to stop.

Time and time again, they have used must-pass, historically bipartisan legislation such as the NDAA to force an extreme agenda on our servicemembers and many others in our country.

As an Air Force veteran and as a proud military child who lived and served across this great country and in many other places outside of this country, I did so with the full protections of Roe v. Wade.

It not only saddens me but also pains me to think that we would give servicewomen orders without the full reproductive freedoms and protections that I had when I was able to serve.

Today, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to choose to be on the side of our servicemembers, military families, and all Americans who love and support them by supporting this motion to instruct.

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Ms. HOULAHAN. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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