[President Joe Biden Announces Opinion That Equal Rights Amendment Is Ratified
President Joe Biden announced on Friday that he believes the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) is ratified, enshrining its protections into the Constitution. The ERA, which was passed by Congress in 1972, aims to guarantee equal rights for women. Biden’s opinion comes after Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the amendment in 2020, and he is now issuing his opinion that the amendment is ratified.
However, the move is likely to face legal challenges, and its next steps remain unclear. The ERA’s ratification deadlines lapsed, and five states have rescinded their approval. Legal experts contend that ratification deadlines were enforceable and that the president’s authority to ratify the amendment more than 50 years after it was passed is questionable.
Biden is relying on the American Bar Association’s opinion, which argues that no time limit was included in the text of the ERA and that the Constitution’s framers wisely avoided the chaos that would have resulted if states were able to take back their ratifying votes at any time.
The archivist of the United States, Dr. Colleen Shogan, will be responsible for certifying and publishing the amendment. However, she has stated that the amendment “cannot be certified as part of the Constitution due to established legal, judicial, and procedural decisions.” The National Archives have also taken the position that the underlying legal and procedural issues have not changed.
The White House has confirmed that Biden is not taking executive action, but rather stating an opinion that the ERA is ratified. The senior Biden administration official added that Biden is using his power as president to make it clear that he believes the ERA is the 28th Amendment to the Constitution.
The announcement has sparked a heated debate, with some praising Biden’s move as a historic step towards enshrining equal rights for women, while others argue that it is an unconstitutional power grab by the president.
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has been a key advocate for certification, arguing that it would give Biden a way to “codify women’s freedom and equality without needing anything from a bitterly divided and broken Congress” in the aftermath of the 2022 Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade.
Biden has taken some executive actions to protect abortion rights, but the White House has essentially exhausted its options short of Congress codifying Roe’s protections. The president has also used his final days in office to push through numerous executive actions, implement key laws, and cement his foreign policy.
It remains to be seen whether Biden’s opinion on the ERA will be sustained in court or reversed by President-elect Donald Trump.
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