Vice President Kamala Harris blasted the strict abortion laws that have passed in GOP-controlled states just days after the first maternal deaths tied to Georgia’s six-week abortion ban became public.
Harris announced a visit to the Atlanta suburbs after ProPublica reported that at least two preventable deaths occurred in the months after Georgia’s law took effect in 2022. The stories have reignited debate over an exception in Georgia’s law that purports to protect the life of the mother during a medical emergency.
“Now we know that at least two women – and those are only the stories we know – here in the state of Georgia died – died – because of the Trump abortion ban,” Harris said to the crowd gathered in a ballroom at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre.
Harris put particular emphasis on the story of 28-year-old Amber Nicole Thurman, who attempted to terminate her pregnancy using abortion medication from a clinic in North Carolina. When she experienced a rare complication and went to an Atlanta-area hospital for care, the doctors waited 20 hours to perform a dilation and curettage, or D&C, to treat sepsis that resulted from an incomplete abortion.
“Understand what a law like this means: Doctors have to wait until the patient is at death’s door before they take action,” Harris said.
“We’re saying that we’re going to create public policy that says that a doctor – a health care provider – will only kick in to give the care that somebody needs if they’re about to die? Think about what we are saying right now. You’re saying that good policy, logical policy, moral policy, humane policy is about saying that a health care provider will only start providing that care when you’re about to die?”
Thurman’s mother and sisters were special guests at Harris’ event with Oprah Thursday night in Michigan.
“Initially, I did not want the public to know my pain,” said Thurman’s mother, Shanette. “I wanted to go through in silence, but I realized that it was selfish. I want y’all to know Amber was not a statistic. She was loved by a family, a strong family, and we would have done whatever to get my baby, our baby, the help that she needed. You’re looking at a mother that is broken.”
Harris has pledged to sign a bill restoring the right to terminate a pregnancy if elected and if Democrats can gain control of the U.S. House and hold onto the U.S. Senate, and she has put reproductive freedom at the center of her campaign.
“This is a health care crisis, and Donald Trump is the architect of this crisis,” Harris said Friday.
At last week’s debate, Trump hailed the Supreme Court justices — three of whom he appointed — for giving full control of abortion laws to state governments. Georgia’s law took effect a month after the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to an abortion.
Trump’s running mate, Ohio U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, celebrated the 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade during a recent visit to Georgia, calling it a “victory.”
Supporters of Georgia’s law, though, argue that the deaths are not a failing of the state’s law but instead highlight the risks attached to abortion medication. They also argue that the doctors should have intervened sooner in Thurman’s case.
Complications from medication abortion, which has been the most common way to terminate a pregnancy since 2020, are rare.
‘That shouldn’t be happening in the United States of America’
Tamara Stevens, who is a longtime reproductive rights advocate and a campaign volunteer for the Harris campaign, said she believes the loss of choice in Georgia has broader impact than some may assume.
It’s at least her top issue. Stevens had an abortion when she was 17 years old after she says she was raped on a college campus in Georgia and became pregnant.
“Without it, nothing else matters,” Stevens said. “If you don’t have rights over your body, the price of bacon and eggs doesn’t matter, housing prices don’t matter. If you don’t have control of your body, what do you have control over?”
Martha Zoller, who is a conservative radio host, pundit and Georgia Life Alliance board member, shrugged off Harris’ Friday visit to Georgia to talk about reproductive freedom.
“It’s all she has to talk about,” Zoller said the day before Harris’ speech. “This is the only issue they think they have. And I think women are smarter than that. And I think that women understand that there are bigger issues they have to vote on.”
A recent poll from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that abortion access is a top issue for about 1 in 10 Georgia voters and that those survey respondents tended to identify as moderate or independent.
That same poll continues to show a tight race in Georgia, which is a must-win state for Trump and a major part of Harris’ strategy to keep a Democrat in the White House. President Joe Biden narrowly won Georgia by less than 12,000 votes in 2020.
A Cobb County woman who came to see Harris speak Friday, who would only identify herself by her first name, Juliet, said reproductive rights have become her top issue for the otherwise swing voter. She said she is thinking of her two daughters and four granddaughters.
“Women are dying in all those states like Georgia that have those strict laws,” she said. “And I won’t vote for a Republican until we get that fixed.”
Vyanti Joseph, who lives in Marietta, said she was appalled by the stories about Thurman and 41-year-oldCandi Miller, who also died in 2022 after experiencing a complication after taking abortion medication.
“It’s 2024. That shouldn’t be happening in the United States of America,” she said.
Kellye Cleveland and Nia Williams, who are both Spelman College students who are set to graduate in 2027, said they were unnerved by the reports of the two maternal deaths in Georgia and said they were heartened to see Harris quickly visit to confront the issue.
“It is very scary to be a woman and live in this state,” said Williams, who said she also likes Harris’ economic message. “I think her coming here so suddenly and addressing that speaks volumes to who she is and what she stands for.”
