Wendy Chun-Hoon, director of the U.S. Department of Labor's Women’s Bureau, issued an official statement addressing the Supreme Court's June 24 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 ruling that established a woman's right to abortion.
Chun-Hoon denounced the decision, stating it "will have a catastrophic impact on women’s employment and economic security," the statement records. She stated the right to reproductive freedom, including the right to seek safe, legal abortion services, is "fundamental to women’s autonomy, health outcomes and economic security."
“Research has shown – repeatedly and consistently – that reproductive autonomy is linked directly to a woman’s ability to get an education, participate in the labor force and increase their earning potential," Chun-Hoon said in the statement. "It has also helped to narrow the gender wage gap."
Chun-Hoon stated that stripping American women of the federally protected right bodily autonomy granted by Roe, and upheld in subsequent rulings by the Supreme Court in the nearly 50 years since, will allow states to ban or seriously restrict abortion access "immediately, often without any exceptions."
“For more than 100 years, the Women’s Bureau has been committed to advancing the status of working women," Chun-Hoon said in the statement.
"Today that means an explicit acknowledgement that access to abortion and all other personal reproductive choices is an issue of health and personal liberty as well as an economic issue that determines the welfare of working women.”
