“An abomination.”
“Shameless.”
“Appalling.”
“Dangerous and exceptionally cruel.”
In a historically diverse and expansive field of Democrats gunning for the chance to take on President Donald Trump next year, few issues have united the sprawling field as much as opposition to the passage of legislation in Alabama that would place a near-total ban on abortions in the state.
The bill, which the state Senate passed Tuesday night, would outlaw virtually all abortions, and is the latest legislation anti-abortion activists hope will spark a legal battle resulting in Roe v. Wade, the historic Supreme Court case that codified abortion rights, being overturned. GOP lawmakers in Alabama rejected amendments that would build out exceptions in the bill for instances of rape or incest, only allowing exceptions when a woman’s health is in danger, making its restrictions on abortion the most extreme in the country.
The crop of 2020 Democrats on Tuesday and Wednesday raced to condemn the bill, with some pleading for Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, a Republican, to veto the legislation that they’re calling an unconstitutional attack on women’s rights. Others in the 2020 field called for abortion rights to be enshrined by law.
The Alabama measure is just the latest state bill targeting abortion rights that advocates say is a direct challenge to the 1973 Roe decision that made abortion legal in the U.S. Last week, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed a so-called heartbeat bill into law that would ban abortions after the point at which a fetal heartbeat can be detected, before most women are know they’re pregnant.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed similar legislation into law last month.The bills have generated a groundswell of opposition among abortion rights advocates who worry that the ideological makeup of the current Supreme Court puts the precedent set by Roe in jeopardy.
Here's how the 2020 Democrats running for president have reacted to the bill:
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), who announced last that she would only appoint judges who would uphold Roe, called the legislation an “outrage” in an interview on MSNBC Wednesday.
“It's nothing short of an attack on women's basic human rights and civil rights, and it's something women in America will have to fight against with everything they've got,” she said, promoting her planned trip to Georgia to hold round-table meetings on its bill.
“We need to lift up the voices of women and family across America who see civil rights and human rights being taken away from them, being decided by legislators and who know nothing about their lives, their health and their ability,” she said. “I'm telling you, this is something that is so harmful to women's ability to get basic, safe access to legal abortion. And it's something women may need in their lifetime. And it's something we should actually protect.”
Sen. Kamala Harris
Harris (D-Calif.) told a town hall audience in New Hampshire Wednesday that “women’s health care is under attack and we will not stand for it,” invoking her time as a prosecutor.
“The idea that supposed leaders have passed a law that would criminalize a physician for assisting a woman on something that she, in consult with her physician, with her God, with her faith leader, has made a decision to do, that it’s her body, that you would criminalize, and say for up to 99 years — which is a life sentence. And this is the same state and the same kind of people who also stand in the way of what women need in terms of a ban on preexisting conditions to have access to issues like prenatal care — like, they need to check their hypocrisy.” she said.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren
Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren condemned the bill as “dangerous and exceptionally cruel,” claiming that “the bill’s authors want to use it to overturn Roe v. Wade. I've lived in that America and let me tell you: We are not going back — not now, not ever.”
Sen. Amy Klobuchar
Klobuchar (D-Minn.) weighed in as well, writing on Twitter that “this bill in Alabama is effectively a ban on abortion. This is wrong. This is unconstitutional.”
Former Vice President Joe Biden
Former Vice President Joe Biden, who holds a commanding lead in early Democratic primary polling, denounced the bill, though less effusively than some of his opponents.
“Republicans in AL, FL, GA, and OH are ushering in laws that clearly violate Roe v. Wade and they should be declared unconstitutional,” he said in a tweet. “Roe v. Wade is settled law and should not be overturned. This choice should remain between a woman and her doctor.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders
Sanders (I-Vt.), who leads the pack in most polling behind only Biden, pleaded with Ivey, the Alabama governor, to veto the bill. “What Alabama is doing is blatantly unconstitutional and disrespects the fundamental right a woman has to make decisions about her own body,” he wrote in a tweet.
Sen. Michael Bennet
Bennet (D-Colo.) took a similar tack, saying in an interview on CNN that “I hope the governor of Alabama will think differently about this than she is today” but pledging to fight the bill if she does sign it.
“It just seems to me that we would be a lot better off hewing to what Roe v. Wade tells us, and leaving this decision in the hands of women and their families, and Alabama is doing something here that just shouldn't be part of America in the 21st century.”
Bennet also invoked his three daughters, saying that abortion rights supporters “find ourselves on the front lines of this war once again” and arguing that panic about the Alabama bill showed Democrats needed to place a renewed focus on the judicial branch.
“I also will say that this is part of a decades-long fight on the right wing to control the courts in this country. … And I think Democrats need to step up our game, and we have not been great at fighting this,” he said.
Former Gov. John Hickenlooper
Hickenlooper, who left office early this year after two terms as Colorado governor, painted the stakes of the bill as especially dire, writing on Twitter that the law, if enacted, “will cost Alabama women their lives, and threatens the reproductive rights of women across the country. We must fight back, and our next president must act to enshrine Roe v. Wade into law.”
Gov. Jay Inslee
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, whose campaign has focused almost exclusively on climate change, called the Alabama measure "an abomination."
“The choices a woman makes about her body should be between her and her doctor and no one else,” he said on Twitter. “We cannot go back to the dark ages of reproductive rights.”
Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke
O’Rourke, a former El Paso congressman whose losing Senate big against conservative Sen. Ted Cruz (T-Texas) garnered significant media attention in 2018, called the bill “not only unconstitutional” but contended “it's a radical attack on women across Alabama and America.”
“We won't back down when it comes to fully protecting Roe v. Wade, fighting dangerous efforts to roll back reproductive health care and defending a woman’s right to access an abortion,” he pledged, adding that “we will fight these dangerous efforts with everything we’ve got in legislatures across the country, in the courts, and at the ballot box.”
Rep. Eric Swalwell
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) asserted that lawmakers in states targeting abortion rights had been emboldened by the president.
“A lawless president has inspired lawless legislatures. Our laws are crystal clear the government cannot come between a woman & her doctor early in a pregnancy,” he said in a tweet. “Yet AL & GA did this anyway, believing laws don’t matter and if pressed, Trump’s justices will protect them. #ProtectRoe”
Former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro
Julián Castro, another 2020 Democrat who has been open about breaking from his Catholic roots in supporting abortion rights, called it “appalling news” that Alabama’s legislature voted “to effectively criminalize abortion.”
“It’s time to stand up and speak out. We must defeat this unconstitutional and shameless attempt to strip women of their right to make health care choices,” he added.
Mayor Pete Buttigieg
Buttigieg, a rising star in the Democratic primary and one of a few candidates to frequently invoke his Christian faith, accused Alabama lawmakers of “ignoring science, criminalizing abortion, and punishing women.”
“Instead, the government's role should be to make sure all women have access to comprehensive affordable care, and that includes safe and legal abortion,” The South Bend, Ind., mayor said in a tweet.
Rep. Tim Ryan
Ryan (D-Ohio), who has not shied away from addressing his fairly recent evolution on abortion rights, came down firmly in opposition to the Alabama legislation.
“Absolutely appalling move from lawmakers in Alabama,” he said on Twitter. “This would effectively ban all abortions -- including cases of rape & incest, punish women & threaten doctors. Government has NO place in this conversation.”
Sen. Cory Booker
Booker (D-N.J.) vowed to “fight in solidarity with women to make sure rights guaranteed by Roe v. Wade will not be threatened by those who have no business making laws about their bodies,” asserting that Alabama lawmakers had “stripped women of health care rights” by passing the bill.
Mayor Wayne Messam
Messam, the longshot candidate and mayor of Miramar, Fla., said that a woman’s right to reproductive choice is settled law,” and cautioning that “this is an incredibly difficult decision for a woman and her family” and “if a medical professional believes a procedure like this is necessary, then the government should not intervene.”
Article originally published on POLITICO Magazine