Vice President Kamala Harris on Friday blamed former President Donald Trump for the deaths of women undergoing abortions in Georgia, citing a report that has been denied as unfounded and that experts say was due to doctor negligence, not the state's restrictions on abortions.
Harris, 59, spoke at length at a rally in Atlanta about the death of Amber Nicole Thurman, who was 28 years old in August 2022. Thurman took an abortion pill but the fetal tissue was not fully expelled from her body, causing her to develop a fatal infection.
The left-leaning media outlet ProPublica published an article. More details on Thurman's case on Monday An article with the headline “Abortion ban delays emergency medical care; Georgia expert says mother's death was preventable” has sparked outrage on the left.
The Democratic presidential candidate on Friday repeatedly blamed Thurman's death on Georgia's so-called “heartbeat law,” which went into effect after the Supreme Court, which includes three justices appointed by President Trump, voted in June 2022 to overturn Roe v. Wade.
“As you know, President Trump's abortion ban [Thurman’s] “The doctors who provided Amber with the treatment she needed could have faced up to 10 years in prison,” Harris said, at one point leading the crowd in chanting Thurman's name.
“Please understand what these laws mean. Doctors must not take action until the patient is on the brink of death.”
But others pointed out that Georgia law did not prohibit doctors from performing the surgery to remove Thurman's tissue.
The law bans selective abortions of children with “a visible human heartbeat” and allows abortions if a doctor determines the mother's life is in danger or if the fetus is deemed non-viable due to a serious medical condition.
“The definition of abortion clearly states that the act is performed to 'cause the death of a fetus,'” attorney Katie Daniel, state policy director for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, told reporters at a press conference Friday.
“Accordingly, the treatment of abortion complications after the death of a child or the management of a spontaneous abortion is not considered an abortion under Georgia law.”
Christina Francis, an obstetrician-gynecologist and CEO of the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists (AAPLOG), argued that Thurman was a victim “of high-risk abortion pills.”
In 2021, under the Harris-Biden administration, the Food and Drug Administration lifted the requirement that abortion pills be obtained directly from certified providers, allowing the pills to be sent by mail.
“These preventable deaths should serve as a wake-up call to all Americans about the inherent dangers of abortion and how the Biden-Harris policy allowing abortion pills to be delivered by mail harms women and their children,” Daniel said.
“In a small number of cases [in Georgia] If a woman is refused, the individual or institution who did so, presumably in violation of state or federal law, should be blamed, not the law enacted to stop the murder of the unborn.”
ProPublica said in its report that the state's Maternal Mortality Review Board determined Thurman's death was “preventable,” but that doctors' delays in treatment had a “significant” impact.
Harris has cited abortion rights as one of the main arguments why voters should choose her over Trump in what is likely to be the closest election in decades.
“This is a health crisis and Donald Trump is the architect of this crisis. He has boasted that he used his own words to overturn Roe v. Wade,” the vice president said Friday.
“He says he's proud. Proud that women are dying, proud that doctors and nurses may be jailed for treating them, proud that young women today have fewer rights than their mothers and grandmothers. How dare he do that?”
Harris has pledged to “proudly” sign the bill into law if Congress passes one to codify Roe v. Wade.
Abortion rights are one of the “freedoms” Harris is promoting in her campaign, and she returned to the theme on Friday.
“This is a fight for the future, this is a fight for freedom,” she said. “We know that in America, freedom is not a given. It is not something that is bestowed. Freedom is ours by definition. It is ours by definition, and that includes the fundamental freedom of women to make their own decisions about their own bodies and not have the government dictate what they want to do with them.”
She has said that Trump would reinstate a nationwide abortion ban if elected president, but Trump has repeatedly countered, saying the issue should be up to each of the 50 states.
Harris repeated the false claims about Thurman's death at a rally in Madison, Wisconsin later that day.
