FACT SHEET: Women’s Preventive Services and Religious Institutions

Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, most health insurance plans will cover women’s preventive services, including contraception, without charging a co-pay or deductible beginning in August, 2012.  This new law will save money for millions of Americans and ensure Americans nationwide get the high-quality care they need to stay healthy.

Today, President Obama will announce that his Administration will implement a policy that accommodates religious liberty while protecting the health of women. Today, nearly 99 percent of all women have used contraception at some point in their lives, but more than half of all women between the ages of 18-34 struggle to afford it.

Under the new policy to be announced today, women will have free preventive care that includes contraceptive services no matter where she works.  The policy also ensures that if a woman works for a religious employer with objections to providing contraceptive services as part of its health plan, the religious employer will not be required to provide, pay for or refer for contraception coverage, but her insurance company will be required to directly offer her contraceptive care free of charge.

The new policy ensures women can get contraception without paying a co-pay and fully accomodates important concerns raised by religious groups by ensuring that objecting non-profit religious employers will not have to provide contraceptive coverage or refer women to organizations that provide contraception.  Background on this policy is included below:

• Under Section 2713 of the Affordable Care Act, the Administration adopted new guidelines that will require most private health plans to cover preventive services for women without charging a co-pay starting on August 1, 2012.  These preventive services include well women visits, domestic violence screening, and contraception, and all were recommended to the Secretary of Health and Human Services by the independent Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Science.

• Today, the Obama Administration will publish final rules in the Federal Register that:

o Exempts churches, other houses of worship, and similar organizations from covering contraception on the basis of their religious objections.

o Establishes a one-year transition period for religious organizations while this policy is being implemented.

• The President will also announce that his Administration will propose and finalize a new regulation during this transition year to address the religious objections of the non-exempted non-profit religious organizations. The new regulation will require insurance companies to cover contraception if the religious organization chooses not to. Under the policy:

o Religious organizations will not have to provide contraceptive coverage or refer their employees to organizations that provide contraception.

o Religious organizations will not be required to subsidize the cost of contraception.

o Contraception coverage will be offered to women by their employers’ insurance companies directly, with no role for religious employers who oppose contraception. 

o Insurance companies will be required to provide contraception coverage to these women free of charge.

o The new policy does not affect existing state requirements concerning contraception coverage.

Covering contraception is cost neutral since it saves money  by keeping women healthy and preventing spending on other health services. For example, there was no increase in premiums when contraception was added to the Federal Employees Health Benefit System and required of non-religious employers in Hawaii.  One study found that covering contraception saved employees $97 per year, per employee. 

Remarks by the President at a Campaign Event

Private Residence
Washington, D.C.

7:09 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.  (Applause.)  Thank you, Laura, for the wonderful introduction -- the best introduction that a Cubs fan has ever given me.  (Laughter.)  The rivalry is fierce in Chicago, but I'll make an exception here.

And I want to thank Karen and Nan for opening up their incredible home.  (Applause.)  To all of you, and to everybody who helped put this together, thank you so much.  I am very grateful.

I’m going to be very brief at the top, because I want to -- usually in these things I like to spend most of my time in a conversation.  I do want to acknowledge that I have as good a Cabinet as I think any President in modern history has had.  And one of the stars of that Cabinet is sitting right here, Kathleen Sebelius.  (Applause.)

All of America has gone through an incredibly difficult, wrenching time these last three years.  And it doesn’t matter whether you are black or white, whether you are Northern or Southern, rich or poor, gay or straight; I think all of us have been deeply concerned over these last three years to making sure that our economy recovers, that we're putting people back to work, that we stabilize the financial system.  The amount of hardship and challenge that ordinary families have gone through over the last three years has been incredible.  And there are still a lot of folks hurting out there. 

The good news is that we're moving in the right direction.  And when I came into office, we were losing 750,000 jobs a month, and this past month we gained 250,000 -- that’s a million job swing.  (Applause.)  And for the last 23 months, we've now created 3.7 million jobs.  And that’s more than any time since 2000 -- or, yes, since, 2005 -- the number of jobs that we created last year, and more manufacturing jobs than any time since the 1990s.

So we're making progress on that front now, but we've still got a long way to go.  Today, we announced a housing settlement, brought about by our Attorney General and states attorneys all across the country.  And as a consequence, we're going to see billions of dollars in loan modifications and help to folks who are seeing their homes underwater.  And that’s going to have a huge impact.

In my State of the Union, we talked about the need for American manufacturing -- companies coming back, insourcing, and recognizing how incredibly productive American workers are; and our need to continue to double down on investments in clean energy; and making sure that our kids are getting trained so that they are competing with any workers in the world, and are also effectively equipped to be great citizens and to understand the world around them. 

And we talked about the fact that we've got to have the same set of values of fair play and responsibility for everybody -- whether it's Wall Street or Main Street.  It means that we have a Consumer Finance Protection Board that is enforcing rules that make sure that nobody is getting abused by predatory lending or credit card scams.  It means that we have regulations in place that protect our air and our water.

And it also means that we ensure that everybody in our society has a fair shot, is treated fairly.  That’s at the heart of the American Dream.  For all the other stuff going on, one thing every American understands is you should be treated fairly; you should be judged on the merits.  If you work hard, if you do a good job, if you're responsible in your community, if you're looking after you family, if you're caring for other people, then that’s how you should be judged.  Not by what you look like, not by how you worship, not by where you come from, not by who you love. 

And so the work that we've done with respect to the LGBT community I think is just profoundly American and is at the heart of who we are.  (Applause.)  And that’s why I could not be prouder of the track record that we've done, starting with the very beginning when we started to change, through executive order, some of the federal policies.  Kathleen -- the work that she did making sure that hospital visitation was applied equally to same-sex couples, just like with anybody else's loved ones.  The changes we made at the State Department.  The changes we made in terms of our own personnel policies.  But also some very high-profile work, like "don't ask, don't tell."

And what's been striking over the course of these last three years is because we've rooted this work in this concept of fairness, and we haven't gone out of our way to grab credit for it, we haven't gone out of our way to call other folks names if they didn’t always agree with us on stuff, but we just kept plodding along -- because of that, in some ways what's been remarkable is how readily the public recognizes this is the right thing to do. 

Think about -- just take "don't ask, don't tell" as an example.  The perception was somehow that this would be this huge, ugly issue.  But because we did it methodically, because we brought the Pentagon in, because we got some very heroic support from people like Bob Gates and Mike Mullen, and they thought through institutionally how to do it effectively -- since it happened, nothing's happened.  (Laughter and applause.)  Nothing's happened.

We still have the best military by far on Earth.  There hasn’t been any notion of erosion and unit cohesion.  It turns out that people just want to know, are you a good soldier, are you a good sailor, are you a good airman, are you a good Marine, good Coast Guardsman.  That's what they're concerned about.  Do you do your job?  Do you do your job well? 

It was striking -- when I was in Hawaii, there is a Marine base close to where we stay.  Probably the nicest piece of real estate I think the Marines have.  (Laughter.)  It is very nice.  And they have this great gym, and you go in there, you work out, and you always feel really inadequate because they're really in good shape, all these people.  (Laughter.)  They're lifting 100-pound dumb bells and all this stuff.  At least three times that I was at that gym, people came up, very quietly, to say, you know what, thank you for ending "don't ask, don't tell."

Now, here's the thing.  I didn’t even know whether they were gay or lesbian.  I didn’t ask -- because that wasn’t the point.  The point was these were outstanding Marines who appreciated the fact that everybody was going to be treated fairly.

We're going to have more work to do on this issue, as is true on a lot of other issues.  There's still areas where fairness is not the rule.  And we're going to have to keep on pushing in the same way -- persistently, politely, listening to folks who don’t always agree with us, but sticking to our guns in terms of what our values are all about.  What American values are all about. 

And that's going to be true on the issues that are of importance to the LGBT community specifically, but it's also going to be true on a host of other issues where we're just going to have to make persistent steady progress.  Whether it is having an energy policy that works for America; whether it is having an immigration policy that is rational so that we are actually both a nation of laws and a nation of immigrants; whether it's making sure that as we get our fiscal house in order we do it in a balanced way where everybody is doing their fair share to help close this deficit.  It's not just being done on the backs of people who don't have enough political clout on Capitol Hill, but it's broadly applied and everybody is doing their fair share.

On all these issues, my view is that if we go back to first principles and we ask ourselves, what does it mean for us as Americans to live in a society where everybody has a fair shot, everybody is doing their fair share, we're playing by a fair set of rules, everybody is engaging in fair play -- then we're going to keep on making progress. 

And that's where I think the American people are at.  It doesn’t mean this is going to be smooth.  It doesn’t mean that there aren’t going to be bumps in the road.  It's not always good politics -- sometimes it's not.  But over the long term, the trajectory of who we are as a nation, I believe that's our national character.  We trend towards fairness and treating people well.  And as long as we keep that in mind, I think we should be optimistic not just about the next election, but about the future of this country.

Thank you.  (Applause.)

END  
7:20 P.M. EST

Executive Order -- Establishing the President's Global Development Council

EXECUTIVE ORDER

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ESTABLISHING THE PRESIDENT'S GLOBAL DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Policy. To help protect national security and further American economic, humanitarian, and strategic interests in the world, it is the policy of the Federal Government to promote and elevate development as a core pillar of American power and chart a course for development, diplomacy, and defense to reinforce and complement one another. As stated in the 2010 National Security Strategy and the Presidential Policy Directive on Global Development, the successful pursuit of development is essential to advancing our national security objectives: security, prosperity, respect for universal values, and a just and sustainable international order. The effectiveness of this development policy will depend in large measure on how we engage with partners, beneficiaries of our development assistance, and stakeholders. We will use evidence-based decision-making in all areas of U.S. development policy and programs, and we commit to foster development expertise and learning worldwide.

Sec. 2. Establishment. There is established the President's Global Development Council (Council). The Council shall be established for administrative purposes within the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) subject to the foreign policy and budgetary guidance of the Secretary of State.

Sec. 3. Membership. The membership of the Council shall be as follows:

(a) The Council shall be composed of the officials described in paragraph (b) of this section and not more than 12 individuals from outside the Federal Government appointed by the President. Appointed members of the Council may serve as representatives of a variety of sectors, including, among others, institutions of higher education, non-profit and philanthropic organizations, civil society, and private industry.

(b) The Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, the USAID Administrator, and the Chief Executive Officer of the Millennium Challenge Corporation shall serve as non-voting members of the Council and may designate, to perform the Council functions of the member, a senior-level official who is part of the member's department, agency, or office, and who is a full-time officer or employee of the Federal Government.

(c) The President shall designate a member of the Council to serve as Chair and another member to serve as Vice Chair. The Chair shall convene and preside at meetings of the Council, determine meeting agendas, and direct its work. The Vice Chair shall perform the duties of the Chair in the absence of the Chair and shall perform such other functions as the Chair may assign.
 

(d) The term of office of members appointed by the President from outside the Federal Government shall be 2 years, and such members shall be eligible for reappointment and may continue to serve after the expiration of their terms until the President appoints a successor. A member appointed to fill a vacancy shall serve only for the unexpired term of such vacancy.

Sec. 4. Mission and Functions. The Council shall advise and support the President, through the National Security Staff and the National Economic Council staff, in furtherance of the policy set forth in section 1 of this order. The Council shall meet regularly and shall:

(a) inform the policy and practice of U.S. global development policy and programs by providing advice to the President and other senior officials on issues including:

(i) innovative, scalable approaches to development with proven demonstrable impact, particularly on sustainable economic growth and good governance;

(ii) areas for enhanced collaboration between the Federal Government and public and private sectors to advance development policy;

(iii) best practices for and effectiveness of research and development in low and middle income economies; and

(iv) long-term solutions to issues central to strategic planning for U.S. development efforts;

(b) support new and existing public-private partnerships by:

(i) identifying key areas for enhanced collaboration and any barriers to collaboration; and

(ii) recommending concrete efforts that the private and public sectors together can take to promote economic development priorities and initiatives; and

(c) increase awareness and action in support of development by soliciting public input on current and emerging issues in the field of global development as well as bringing to the President's attention concerns and ideas that would inform policy options.

Sec. 5. Administration of the Council. (a) The heads of executive departments and agencies shall assist and provide information to the Council, consistent with applicable law, as may be necessary to carry out the functions of the Council.

(b) Funding and administrative support for the Council shall be provided by USAID to the extent permitted by law and within existing appropriations.

(c) The USAID Administrator shall appoint an Executive Director who shall be a Federal officer or employee of USAID and serve as a liaison to the Administrator and the Executive Office of the President and consult with relevant executive departments, agencies, and offices on matters and activities pertaining to the Council.

(d) The members of the Council who are appointed from outside the Federal Government shall serve without compensation for their work on the Council. Members of the Council may, however, receive travel expenses, including per diem in lieu of subsistence, as authorized by law for persons serving intermittently in the Government service (5 U.S.C. 5701-5707).

(e) Insofar as the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), as amended (5 U.S.C. App.), may apply to the Council, any functions of the President under FACA, except that of reporting to the Congress, shall be performed by the USAID Administrator in accordance with the guidelines issued by the Administrator of General Services.

Sec. 6. Termination. The Council shall terminate 2 years after the date of this order, unless renewed by the President.

Sec. 7. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) authority granted by law to a department or agency, or the head thereof; or

(ii) functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.

(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

BARACK OBAMA