Kamala Harris heads to Arizona after abortion ban
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[April 12, 2024]
By Trevor Hunnicutt
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris travels on
Friday to Arizona, three days after a court there upheld a 160-year-old
abortion ban, igniting a charged issue in one of 2024's most competitive
election states.
Arizona's conservative Supreme Court sent a shockwave through the
narrowly divided state that could swing the presidential race and
determine control of the Senate.
Strategists in both parties said the ruling, which outlaws nearly all
abortions, would push even Republican-leaning moderates toward
Democrats, while also animating young voters and voters of color.
U.S. President Joe Biden has tasked Harris, a former prosecutor and
senator, with leading the administration's reaction to the U.S. Supreme
Court's 2022 ruling overturning Roe v. Wade abortion rights and with
reaching core liberal voters undecided on a second, four-year term for
the president.
Biden beat Republican opponent Donald Trump in Arizona by fewer than
11,000 votes out of 3.3 million ballots cast in 2020, the Democrat's
narrowest margin of victory in any state.
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Democrats think restrictions on reproductive rights can help them secure
another victory in the border state where voters had been more focused
on cost-of-living issues and immigration.
"We all must understand who is to blame: It is the former president,
Donald Trump," Harris will say in Tucson before reproductive health
patients and providers, according to excerpts from a campaign official.
"Here's what a second Trump term looks like: more bans, more suffering,
less freedom. But we are not going to let that happen."
Harris visited Phoenix, Arizona's capital, just last month to talk about
abortion rights as part of a "Fight for Reproductive Freedoms" tour that
has taken her to 20 states and included a visit to a Minnesota health
clinic that offers abortion services.
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![](../images/041224PIX/news_w47.jpg)
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris looks on during a visit to the St.
Paul Health Center, a clinic that performs abortions, in St. Paul,
Minnesota, U.S., March 14, 2024. REUTERS/Nicole Neri/File Photo
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Trump, set to face Biden again in November's election, has distanced
himself from the Arizona ruling. On Wednesday, he said the court had
gone too far in reviving a near-total abortion ban, even while
defending the Supreme Court decision that permitted states to
restrict abortion.
"President Trump could not have been more clear. These are decisions
for people of each state to make," said Karoline Leavitt, a Trump
campaign spokesperson.
The Biden campaign has aired an advertisement in Arizona in which a
Texas woman tearfully describes almost dying after she was denied an
abortion following a miscarriage. Across a black screen, the words
"Donald Trump did this" flash as her sobs continue in the
background.
Asked at the White House on Wednesday what he would say to the
people of Arizona, Biden replied, "Elect me."
Biden ran on legalizing abortion but Democrats did not deliver him
such a bill when they controlled Congress by slim margins from
2021-2023.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Don Durfee and Diane
Craft)
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