Sample Letter to Congress

Dear Readers,

Here is a sample letter you can send to Congress to oppose the dirge of anti-women legislation currently in the house!

Dear Congressperson:

I am gravely concerned over the attack on women’s health that is occurring in the House of Representatives.

New leadership has proposed completely eliminating all Title X funding and HR 217, which would deny Title X funding to women’s health providers. These funds allow community health centers to provide crucial services like birth control and pap tests and cancer screenings to millions of women and families each year. Without that funding and without those health centers, women and families across the country will no longer receive critical health care.

HR 3 has been introduced and would ban private insurance coverage for abortion for millions of women. It would go so far as to raise taxes for people and small businesses that purchase this coverage with their own money. The true intent of this bill is to end insurance coverage for virtually all abortions, including private insurance that Americans pay for with their own money. HR 3 creates an alarming new definition of what constitutes “federal funding.” The unprecedented step of defining “federal funding” to include tax exemptions or other tax expenditures could threaten a wide array of other activities.

HR 358 Amends the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) to prohibit federal  funds from being used to cover any part of the costs of any health plan that includes coverage of abortion services. The Guttmacher Institute estimates that as many as one in four women enrolled in Medicaid who wants to have an abortion is forced to continue her pregnancy because she cannot afford the procedure Because of poverty in the United States, the denial of federal funding affects women of color most heavily. 

United States policy must safeguard a woman's health, regardless of how she receives her health insurance.  Additionally, the idea that these bills will strengthen our economy is misleading. Americans want Congress to create jobs and strengthen our economy, not to argue over new ways to restrict reproductive health. The discussion should be about reproductive health measures that would save money and help our economy, such as fully covering family planning under our new health care laws.

I stand against the continuing resolution to zero out funding for Title X. I stand against HR 217, which would leave women without a trusted place to get important care. I stand against HR 3, which unfairly punishes a woman for carrying comprehensive health insurance and I stand against HR 358 which will disproportionately affect poor women and women of color. Stop bans on abortion coverage --They are misleading, unfair and dangerous. Women’s healthcare, including abortion, must be accessible for all women.

Sincerely,

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