Harris Meets with Abortion Providers as White House Braces for Potential Roe Reversal
Vice President Kamala Harris met with abortion providers via livestream on Thursday afternoon, weeks after the leak of a draft Supreme Court opinion that would overturn the 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade.
“Earlier this month, we learned that the United States Supreme Court is poised to strike down Roe. If they do, it will be the first time in the last 50 years at least that the Court has recognized a Constitutional right, only to take it away,” Harris said in her opening remarks.
Harris said the reversal of Roe would be an “extreme step backward,” and condemned a law approved by the Oklahoma state legislature on Thursday that would ban almost all abortions from the moment of fertilization.
“It’s outrageous, and it’s just the latest in a series of extreme laws around the country,” Harris said.
Harris was scheduled meet with OB/GYNs as well as with Dr. Colleen McNicholas, the chief medical officer for Planned Parenthood of St. Louis, and Helen Weems, founder of All Families Healthcare in Montana, Fox News reported earlier on Thursday.
Harris has previously warned that “women will die” if Roe v. Wade is overturned.
“I don’t mean to sound alarmist, I mean this: Women will die,” Harris told the San Francisco Chronicle in December 2021. “I’m very concerned about it. Women will die. In particular, women who don’t have economic resources and can’t then travel to places or somehow have access to safe reproductive health care, including abortion. And it is not an extreme statement, it is a fact.”
Harris has also condemned the leaked draft by Justice Samuel Alito, signed by five of the Court’s conservative justices, that would overturn Roe.
“Roe ensures a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion. It also, at its root, protects the fundamental right to privacy,” Harris said in a statement on May 3. “If the right to privacy is weakened, every person could face a future in which the government can potentially interfere in the personal decisions you make about your life.”
Various state governments have been preparing for the potential repeal of Roe. Colorado governor Jared Polis, a Democrat, signed a bill in April codifying the right to an abortion in that state’s law. Meanwhile, Nebraska governor Pete Ricketts, a Republican, told CNN’s Dana Bash on State of the Union on Sunday that he would convene a special session of the state legislature to pass a ban on abortions if the Supreme Court overturns Roe.
