American Bridge 21st Century Co-Chair Cecile Richards sat down with The American Independent to discuss her career fighting for reproductive freedom and the state of abortion rights going into the 2024 election year.
The American Independent: Cecile Richards believes abortion ‘was just the first attack’
By Rebekah Sager | June 8th, 2023
Key Points:
- Richards told the American Independent Foundation that when she learned that Roe had been overturned in June 2022: “I guess my thought was, This is a day I knew was always possible but really hoped would not happen. … And of course, my other thought was, There are a lot of people, a lot of women, who are going to suffer as a result. And, of course, that’s what we’re seeing come true.”
- Richards said that despite the many states that have enacted restrictive abortion bans since Roe was overturned — 14 and counting — she remains confident that people have been galvanized to advocate for abortion rights in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision.
- “I feared that this would be seen as some sort of obscure decision by a Supreme Court that was untouchable and far away,” Richards said. “But in fact, after Kansas, and going through the midterm elections, and certainly continuing on into Wisconsin, the voters have been very clear. They do not want to live in a country where the government is making decisions about pregnancy.”
- Richards said it’s the impassioned stories people are sharing since the fall of Roe that will keep people engaged in the pro-abortion movement. “People being denied miscarriage care at hospitals; women having to flee their states to access safe and legal abortion; doctors being criminalized for caring for their patients,” Richards said. “There are just any number of ways in which it’s clear this is unacceptable. … It is going to be the stories of everyday Americans seeping into the consciousness of voters everywhere, and again, I believe we’ve already seen that.”
- She said she thinks it’s stories of everyday people that are missing in the conversation: “We hear about some of the really severe, traumatic stories, but we don’t hear enough about just the everyday experience of women and families who no longer have the right to make their own decisions about the most fundamental issue in our lifetime, which is when and whether to have a family.”
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Published: Jun 9, 2023 | Last Modified: Jun 14, 2023