IV 
118TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION 
H. RES. 309 
Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Food and 
Drug Administration has the authority to approve drugs for abortion care. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
APRIL 19, 2023 
Ms. MANNING (for herself, Ms. CARAVEO, Ms. MENG, Ms. NORTON, Mr. CON-
NOLLY, Mr. HIGGINS of New York, Mr. PAPPAS, Ms. CHU, Mr. DELUZIO, 
Ms. PRESSLEY, Mr. TONKO, Ms. CROCKETT, Ms. TOKUDA, Ms. 
BUDZINSKI, Mr. IVEY, Mr. SCHNEIDER, Ms. SALINAS, Mr. PANETTA, Ms. 
PETTERSEN, Ms. SCHAKOWSKY, Mr. CASAR, Ms. PORTER, Mr. MRVAN, 
Mr. LARSEN of Washington, Ms. SCANLON, Mr. NICKEL, Ms. WILLIAMS 
of Georgia, Mrs. SYKES, Ms. ESCOBAR, Ms. WILD, Mr. AUCHINCLOSS, 
Mr. LANDSMAN, Ms. TITUS, and Ms. MOORE of Wisconsin) submitted the 
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and 
Commerce 
RESOLUTION 
Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that 
the Food and Drug Administration has the authority 
to approve drugs for abortion care. 
Whereas Congress has entrusted the Food and Drug Admin-
istration (FDA) with the safety of the United States peo-
ple for more than 80 years; 
Whereas, on June 25, 1938, President Franklin D. Roosevelt 
signed the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act 
(FFDCA) into law, authorizing the FDA to oversee, reg-
ulate, and approve new drugs; 
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•HRES 309 IH 
Whereas, on October 10, 1962, President John F. Kennedy 
signed the Kefauver-Harris Amendments to the FFDCA 
into law, charging the FDA with the authority to approve 
new drugs that were established by manufacturers to be 
proven safe and effective; 
Whereas, since the enactment of the FFDCA, the FDA has 
approved more than 19,000 prescription drug products 
for marketing; 
Whereas, on July 19, 1996, the FDA’s Reproductive Health 
Drugs Advisory Committee voted that mifepristone was 
safe for use and effective; 
Whereas, on September 28, 2000, the FDA approved the use 
of mifepristone for medical termination of pregnancy 
after a nearly 5-year review process; 
Whereas, in August 2008, an audit of the approval and over-
sight of mifepristone by the Government Accountability 
Office found that the approval of mifepristone was con-
sistent with the approval and oversight of other drugs; 
Whereas mifepristone is used in more than half of abortion 
procedures nationwide; 
Whereas the safety and efficacy of medication abortion is 
supported by over two decades of scientific research and 
data collection; 
Whereas there is overwhelming evidence that medication 
abortion is safe and effective for virtually anyone who 
wants to end an early pregnancy, with a safety record of 
over 99 percent; 
Whereas more than 5,000,000 people in the United States 
have used mifepristone since its approval to safely end 
pregnancies at home and at health care centers, to safely 
treat miscarriages, and in other reproductive health care; 
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•HRES 309 IH 
Whereas access to mifepristone remains a lifeline for millions 
of Americans who seek reproductive health care; 
Whereas, on April 7, 2023, the United States District Court 
for the Northern District of Texas issued an injunction 
that stayed the FDA’s approval of mifepristone; and 
Whereas, on April 7, 2023, the United States District Court 
for the Eastern District of Washington issued an injunc-
tion that preliminarily enjoined the FDA to refrain from 
making changes to its approval of mifepristone in the 
plaintiffs’ States of Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Dela-
ware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Min-
nesota, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, 
Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington, and the Dis-
trict of Columbia: Now, therefore, be it 
Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Rep-
resentatives that— 
(1) by enacting the Federal Food, Drug, and 
Cosmetic Act and subsequent amendments, Congress 
intended for and authorized the Food and Drug Ad-
ministration to review and approve drug applications 
under its expert authority; 
(2) Congress intended the provisions of the 
Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to govern 
any review of Food and Drug Administration ap-
proval decisions to ensure that such decisions are 
given due deference, are based on scientifically driv-
en assessments made by experts at Food and Drug 
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•HRES 309 IH 
Administration, and maximize the public’s access to 
life- and health-preserving medications; 
(3) Congress did not intend for Federal courts 
to engage in independent judicial review of the sci-
entific evidence before the Food and Drug Adminis-
tration and make their own findings about a drug’s 
safety and efficacy; 
(4) a Federal court’s attempt to reverse 
mifepristone’s approval represents a violation of the 
intent of Congress in passing the Federal Food, 
Drug, and Cosmetic Act; 
(5) the stay of mifepristone’s approval by a dis-
trict court represents a threat to other duly Food 
and Drug Administration-regulated products; and 
(6) all people living in the United States should 
have the ability to make decisions about their own 
lives, futures, and reproductive health care, includ-
ing abortion. 
Æ 
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