“The budget blueprint passed by the United States Senate this weekend offers a balanced, reasonable approach that would reduce the deficit while protecting women’s health, preserving the safety net, and raising new revenues from those who can afford it. In those ways and many others, it stands in stark contrast to the short-sighted House approach to the budget, which would send us backward on women’s health and imperil the most vulnerable people in our society.

We applaud the bipartisan support for the Senate provision that protects women’s coverage for birth control, and are pleased that the counter measure that would have allowed employers and insurers to deny women coverage for any health care service was defeated so decisively. We are also extremely pleased that the Senate blueprint protects the Affordable Care Act from repeal.

The Senate blueprint would maintain Medicare’s promise for older women by establishing a reserve fund to protect Medicare’s guaranteed benefit — and by prohibiting efforts to replace guaranteed benefits with the House-passed plan to turn Medicare into a voucher program.

And it would establish a badly needed reserve fund to support efforts to ensure equal pay for equal work, in order to help close the gender-based wage gap that causes grave harm to women and families.

We thank Senators Murray and Mikulski for their leadership, as well as Senators Shaheen and Stabenow, and every senator from both sides of the political aisle who stood up for women and families by supporting their amendments. The Senate and House approaches to the deficit are a study in contrasts. The Senate resolution is the right approach for women, families and the nation, and should advance, while the House budget is unworthy of our nation and should be discarded.”