(Georgia Recorder) — Vice President Kamala Harris has put access to reproductive rights at the center of her presidential campaign, and in 10 states, the issue is literally on the ballot this year.
But in a state like Georgia, where the state constitution does not allow citizen-led ballot initiatives, the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling that ended the federal right to an abortion and left it to state legislatures to regulate is still casting a long shadow.
In Georgia’s handful of competitive legislative races, the Democratic incumbents or candidates are not shying away from the issue.
“I think that women in Georgia are speaking loud and clear that we want to make sure that our reproductive rights are protected, and I stand with them, and I am one of them,” said Tangie Herring, a Macon Democrat and educator running to represent a newly created majority Black House district in middle Georgia.
Herring, who has had a miscarriage, said she was disturbed by recent revelations that two Georgia women died after trying to have an abortion shortly after the state’s six-week ban took effect.
The first-time candidate said she believes Georgia’s new abortion restrictions should be repealed and that access to contraceptives and in-vitro fertilization should be protected.
And she says the issue of reproductive freedom is on the minds of the district’s voters, along with other concerns like economic opportunity and public safety.
“There are several things that are so important to Georgia families right now, and reproductive rights is one of them,” Herring said.
The GOP candidate in the race for the open seat, Noah Redding Harbuck, describes himself on his campaign website as “100% pro-life.” He is part of the slate of Republicans who are receiving a boost from Gov. Brian Kemp’s leadership committee.
The Forsyth Republican said Tuesday that he does not believe abortions should be allowed even when the fetus is the result of rape or incest or when the life of the mother is in danger. Those are exceptions that are currently allowed under Georgia’s 2019 law.
Harbuck, who is also a first-time candidate, said he would be open to considering a bill that would protect access to in-vitro fertilization in Georgia, though he said he would need to see the details.
House Speaker Jon Burns, a Newington Republican, has backed an effort to enshrine such protections in state law but a specific proposal has not yet been unveiled. The new legislative session starts in January.
Harbuck, who is an insurance agent, said a central part of his campaign pitch is working to lower insurance rates. He said he does not see access to reproductive rights as a big issue in his legislative race.
“I just think a good candidate will win this race if they can come up with commonsense solutions for what we’re concerned about in this district, which is basically inflation, the rising cost of insurance and groceries,” he said.
The issue may not be the most pressing for the majority of voters this year – that has consistently been inflation and the economy in polling – but a recent survey from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that it’s a top issue for some voters.
Nearly 8% of people said abortion was the issue that would have the biggest influence on their vote for president. That was overshadowed by the economy, inflation, preserving democracy and immigration.
That same poll also found that a significant number of Georgia voters oppose the state’s existing abortion restrictions.
About 45% of likely Georgia voters – including about 54% of women and nearly 62% of Black voters asked – said an abortion should be “easier to obtain,” according to the survey.
Harris often rails against what she calls “Trump abortion bans,” a term she has applied to Georgia’s six-week ban on most abortions.
Harris traveled to Georgia in September to give a speech focused on reproductive access, and she has often highlighted the death of a Georgia woman who died trying to have an abortion as she gives speeches on the campaign trail and in an ad featuring the woman’s family.
“What we know is that Republican candidates either at the top of the ticket with Donald Trump or down to state legislative races, they don’t want to talk about this issue because they understand that they’re on the wrong side of history,” said Congresswoman Nikema Williams, an Atlanta Democrat who is also the chairwoman of the Democratic Party of Georgia.
“And so we’re encouraging our candidates to continue to talk about this, especially down-ballot races because that’s where these decisions now have been reverted to,” she said.
‘Mini referendums on choice’
Melita Easters, the executive director and founding chair of the Georgia WIN List, has called this election “Roevember.”
Easters said a record number of women candidates qualified this year, which was the first chance to qualify as a legislative candidate since the U.S. Supreme Court decision that ended the federal right to an abortion in the summer of 2022. Georgia’s six-week ban took effect a month after the Supreme Court’s ruling.
Easters said she views some of the legislative races, particularly the ones in the Atlanta suburbs and in Macon, as “mini referendums on choice.” Georgia WIN List is a political action committee focused on electing more Democratic women who support reproductive rights.
To highlight the candidates’ positions on the issue, at least in three House races, the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia announced a $300,000 campaign through its ACLU Voter Education Fund that has sent mailers and paid for digital advertising. That includes the Macon district, where the organization is also running an ad on a Black radio station.
The ACLU of Georgia filed the lawsuit that led to a federal judge ordering lawmakers to create new majority Black districts, including five in the House and two in the Senate. The organization is also now part of a lawsuit challenging the state’s 2019 abortion law that is pending with the Georgia Supreme Court.
“We wanted to make it very clear where folks stood on these issues, because, as we’ve seen with the sort of whiplash of the abortion rulings, that is just such an important issue,” said Fallon McClure, who is the organization’s deputy director for policy and advocacy.
For a second time, the state’s six-week ban was lifted for about a week this fall after a Fulton County judge struck it down as unconstitutional.
“Unfortunately, politics is, I think, intentionally so confusing when you’re not necessarily in it every day, and so, we want to help connect the dots,” McClure said.
Other than the Macon race between Harbuck and Herring, the ACLU of Georgia’s voter education campaign is also focusing on the race between Lilburn Democratic state Rep. Jasmine Clark – who voted against the six-week ban in 2019 – and Republican Elvia Davila and the contest between Dacula Democratic state Rep. Farooq Mughal and Buford Republican Sandy Donatucci.
Democratic candidates have been outspoken on the issue.
When former President Donald Trump campaigned in suburban Gwinnett County this month, a group of Georgia Democrats – including two legislative candidates in competitive races, Michelle Kang of Suwanee and Laura Murvartian of Johns Creek – held a press conference outside Duluth City Hall to blast the Republican candidate’s record on reproductive rights.
Herring, Clark, Mughal, Kang and Murvartian are among the slate of candidates endorsed by Planned Parenthood Southeast Advocates this year.
Since the 2022 Supreme Court decision, Kang said Georgia women face a “dangerous new reality.”
“Donald Trump didn’t do it alone, and he is not the only anti-choice extremist on the ballot this cycle,” Kang said, referring to the GOP incumbent she is trying to unseat, Duluth Republican state Rep. Matt Reeves.
Murvartian, who is challenging Peachtree Corners Republican state Rep. Scott Hilton, said voters usually cite the economy and inflation as their top concerns. But she said she also connects with them over reproductive rights and the push for gun safety legislation, particularly in the wake of the Barrow County school shooting this year.
“When you hear (Trump) say that it’s now going to the states because it will reflect the will of the people, that does not work in a state like Georgia,” Murvartian said, pointing to GOP-drawn political maps and the absence of citizen-led ballot referendums.
“The will of the people is not being heard in Georgia,” she said.
Both candidates running in these suburban districts said they are seeking out Republican-leaning women, who they said often agree with them when it comes to access to reproductive care.
‘Out of touch’
The governor, who signed the state’s six-week abortion ban into law in 2019, said he isn’t worried about the Democrats’ emphasis on access to reproductive rights hurting Republicans.
He and other Georgia Republicans are betting most voters will think about their pocketbook when they cast their ballot.
“They’re so out of touch with what this election is all about,” Kemp told reporters recently, referring to Democrats. “That’s really the only thing they’ve got to talk about, but they’re missing the mood of the voter that’s out there. Voters every day, when they go to the grocery store, that’s not what they’re thinking about.”
The governor has been campaigning with GOP legislative candidates across the state as Republicans work to hold onto their majorities in the state House and Senate, where Kemp relies on support to push through his legislative agenda each year. He cited a recently announced third round of income tax refunds – $250 for single tax filers, $375 to head-of-household filers or $500 to married couples filing jointly – as an example of a future priority.
Today, Republicans have a 102-78 advantage in the House and a 33-23 edge in the Senate.
Kemp recently appeared with four Gwinnett County candidates – sitting incumbents Hilton and Reeves and candidates Davila and Donatucci – at StillFire Brewing in Suwanee at a campaign event meant to rally supporters to the polls to protect those majorities.
Democrats have their sights on Reeves’ and Hilton’s seats as some of their top prospects for flipping in 2024. In 2020, President Joe Biden took about 53% of the vote in Reeves’ district and about 52% in Hilton’s. And Republicans see Donatucci as one of their best shots at a flip – Mughal’s district was nearly evenly split between Biden and Trump.
Hilton was not in office when lawmakers passed the six-week abortion ban, and when he was asked after the recent campaign event whether he supports the current law, he declined to say.
He said this when asked what he communicates to constituents on the subject: “We have good conversations at the door, and I share my heart. They share theirs, and when we leave the conversation, nine times out of 10 I have their vote. Because what I find with any independent voter and even with our own family, while we may not agree on 10% of the issues, we agree on everything else. And so that’s what’s important.”
Hilton said he thinks “kitchen table issues are so important in this election.”
Reeves, who also was not in office when the 2019 restrictions were passed, declined to comment on the existing law until the Georgia Supreme Court rules on the pending challenge before them.
“I want to hear from the courts on that important issue, and I respect the rule of law, and I’m going to be very deferential to what the Georgia Supreme Court says,” Reeves said, noting that he is an attorney.
Donatucci said she thinks the law, including the six-week ban, should be left as it is but that more should be done to provide resources for mothers and their children.
“I am pro-life. I support both the mother and the child,” Donatucci said. “I think it’s very important, now that the law has passed, that we make sure that we support the mom and the baby, whether it be through the medical care throughout the term, and then the education through and afterwards, if they’ve missed that because of their pregnancy.”
Davila said she believed the issue should be left to women to decide but did not directly respond to a question about whether the six-week abortion ban should be changed.
“I think that every woman knows her body, and I think life is beautiful, and it’s not just about abortion, it’s about life,” Davila said. “There’s a lot of things that are going on as far as not keeping safe communities. So, we need to have safe communities, because a lot of people are dying because we don’t have safe communities in Gwinnett.”
