Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), a senior member and former chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, released the following statement in response to news that Costco will not sell mifepristone at its stores.
“I am deeply alarmed by news reports that Costco is refusing to sell safe, effective, and legal medication for no other reason than to appease the politics of anti-abortion fanatics. I refuse to stand by and allow far-right extremists to bully major corporations and dictate what medicine women can or cannot get access to. Where it is legal, retailers and major pharmacies must absolutely make medication abortion available to the women who need it.
“Mifepristone is safe and effective—we cannot live in a world where the availability of women’s health care whipsaws back and forth based on the whims of extremists who want to deny women access to basic health care. I am demanding that Costco immediately reverse course—follow the science and the facts, not the demands of far-right anti-abortion extremists.”
In May, Murray pressed FDA Commissioner Marty Makary on the Trump administration’s attempts to lay the groundwork to rip away access to mifepristone based on discredited junk science from anti-abortion activists. In March, at Dr. Makary’s nomination hearing before the Senate HELP Committee, Senator Murray pressed Dr. Makary to commit to upholding the science on mifepristone and contraception—he refused to definitively answer her question.
Senator Murray leads the Democratic caucus on reproductive health care and, throughout her career, has beat back countless Republican attacks on reproductive care and other family planning services—and is widely credited with successfully pushing the Bush administration’s FDA to follow the science and make Plan B available over the counter. Senator Murray led the response in Congress to FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, a lawsuit brought by Republican anti-abortion extremists trying to rip away access to mifepristone, a safe and effective abortion medication that was approved by FDA in 2000—Murray led multiple amicus briefs, organized her colleagues, and raised the alarm at every turn. Last June, the Supreme Court dismissed the case on standing, but Murray made clear that “the nationwide threat to medication abortion has not gone away—far from it. If Donald Trump and his anti-abortion allies return to power, they will do everything they can to rip away access to mifepristone and ban abortion nationwide.” In March of 2023, Murray pressed national pharmacies, including Costco, to ensure access to mifepristone.
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