Harris backs ending Senate filibuster to restore national abortion rights

(Reuters) - Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee in November's presidential election, on Tuesday said she backed ending a procedural tool that currently requires a supermajority in the Senate to pass legislation to protect the right to an abortion nationally.

Since a 2022 Supreme Court decision overturned the Roe v. Wade ruling on abortion, about a dozen U.S. states have passed laws banning or severely limiting abortion rights, which has become a key issue in the 2024 election.

Harris wants Congress to pass a national law codifying access to a safe abortion.

The support of 60 senators is required to pass most legislation in the upper chamber at present. On Tuesday, Harris said in an interview that she wants to lower the threshold to a simple majority.

"We should eliminate the filibuster for Roe... to actually put back in law the protections for reproductive freedom, and for the ability of every person and every woman to make decisions about their own body," she told Wisconsin Public Radio.

Democrats removed the filibuster in 2013 on judicial nominees and Republicans went further in 2017 to include Supreme Court nominees.

Some Democrats have called for getting rid of the 60-vote requirement entirely, but have yet to do so, partly due to opposition from centrist senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, who will not return to the Senate next year.

(Reporting by Costas Pitas; Editing by Bill Berkrot)

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