President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris visited Manassas on Jan. 23, with their spouses, First Lady Jill Biden and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff. They were there to mark the 51st anniversary of the landmark abortion rights case, Roe v. Wade. The event is part of Harris’s announced Reproductive Freedom Tour, a series of events across the country to “bring together people to address the freedom of every American to make decisions about their own body.”

Described as a campaign event for the Biden-Harris ticket, the timing of the Manassas gathering on Tuesday provided a counterpoint to the first GOP primary in New Hampshire on the same day, where former President Donald Trump led in polling among Republican voters at the time. Trump received a higher percentage of the vote than challenger Nikki Haley. 

Reproductive rights and related women’s health issues are expected to be major issues in the Biden/Harris re-election campaign. Harris’ first tour event was on Jan. 22 in Wisconsin, with at least three additional locations planned in the next two months. The President joined Harris in Manassas to highlight steps the administration is taking to expand access to abortion medication and contraception, to counter state abortion bans that have sprung up in many states. Biden spoke about expanded coverage for no-cost contraception through the Affordable Care Act. He indicated the Departments of the Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services are issuing new guidance to clarify standards and support expanded coverage of a broader range of FDA-approved contraceptives, at no cost, under the Affordable Care Act among other actions. 

This session, Democrats in the Virginia legislature in both houses have introduced constitutional amendments to guarantee the fundamental right to reproductive freedom in the Commonwealth. Hearings on those amendments are being deferred until 2025 to match the State’s administrative rules for addressing constitutional amendments which when passed, are on the general election ballot, then must be followed by passing a second time in the General Assembly. Voters in Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Kansas, and California already have rejected abortion bans in new legislation. 

On June 24, 2022, The Supreme Court, Justices appointed by Trump, held that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion, taking away the right to reproductive choice outlined in Roe versus Wade that had stood for 50 years.