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Kamala Harris is campaigning in Texas to highlight the state’s abortion ban

Matte Jr
Kamala Harris is campaigning in Texas to highlight the state’s abortion ban

Vice President Kamala Harris will visit Texas on Friday for an attention-grabbing campaign rally focused on reproductive freedom in the final weeks of the 2024 presidential campaign.

Texas is not a swing state, but it passed one of the strictest abortion bans in the country after Donald Trump’s Supreme Court justices nominated Roe v. Wade in 2022, ending the federal right to abortion.

The Democratic presidential candidate will speak at an event alongside Texas women who have had to navigate the state’s abortion ban, according to a senior Harris campaign official. Rep. Colin Allred (D), who is within striking distance of Sen. Ted Cruz (R) in polls in the Texas Senate race, will also join Harris.

The trip to Texas comes as Trump, the Republican nominee, also campaigns in non-competitive states like New York and California and engages in high-profile stunts, such as the deep fryer at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania.

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While in Texas, the campaign manager said Harris will sit down for an interview with podcaster Brené Brown.

Opposition to abortion bans has led to Democratic victories in special elections and helped stave off a “red wave” in the 2022 midterm elections. Democrats have maintained a strong focus on reproductive freedom throughout the election cycle, while Republicans have tried to distract from the issue by fear-mongering against transgender people. Abortion has created a gender gap in polls that show Harris leading by double digits among women.

Harris previously appeared with Kate Cox, a Texas woman who was forced to leave the state for abortion care after complications from a wanted pregnancy threatened her health. Cox announced at a Harris rally in June that she was pregnant again thanks to abortion care she received outside of Texas.

Cox was one of more than 35,000 women who traveled outside Texas for abortion care in 2023, according to an estimate by the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that advocates for abortion rights.

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