Vice president and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris announced Tuesday that she has selected Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate in the upcoming election, and pro-abortion groups are celebrating the news.
The pro-abortion organization Reproductive Freedom for All (formerly NARAL Pro-Choice America) has applauded Walz as Harris’ vice president pick. “Gov. Walz has been a steadfast champion for reproductive freedom, working tirelessly to protect and expand abortion access for Minnesotans. We applaud Vice President Harris for selecting him as her running mate—solidifying the most pro-reproductive freedom presidential ticket in U.S. history.”
Planned Parenthood Votes’ executive director Jenny Lawson also applauded Walz’s selection in a press release, calling Walz “a reproductive rights champion for Minnesotans who’s signed laws expanding and protecting the right to abortion and making health care more affordable.” Lawson also claimed that, despite the Trump campaign’s position that abortion should be left to states to individually decide, “The Trump-Vance ticket is the biggest threat to reproductive freedom we’ve seen in generations and they must be stopped. Planned Parenthood Votes is working to ensure Kamala Harris and Tim Walz make it to the White House, where they can build on the work Harris has done as vice president to protect our lives, bodies, and futures.”
During his tenure as Governor, Walz signed a number of pro-abortion bills, including a bill dubbed the “most extreme” in the nation by Republican Senate Minority Leader Mark Johnson, which legalized abortion up to birth with no restrictions and established “reproductive freedom” as a “fundamental right.” Despite the media’s insistence that abortions simply don’t happen so late in pregnancy, Minnesota is one of nine states in the nation (plus D.C.) that has legalized abortion without gestational limits since the reversal of Roe v. Wade.
Walz also signed a bill eliminating state funding for pregnancy resource centers, and signed legislation shielding law-breaking abortionists. Walz also issued an executive order during the overturn of Roe v. Wade, signaling his intention to protect abortion in the state.
“My office has been and will continue to be a firewall against legislation that would reverse reproductive freedom,” Walz said in the order. “This order shows our administration’s commitment to protecting patients and health care providers. Our administration is doing everything we can to protect individuals’ right to make their own health care decisions.”
Walz has collaborated with abortion giant Planned Parenthood on a number of occasions, and accompanied Harris when she visited a St. Paul Planned Parenthood abortion facility in March. The Recount reported that this visit may have left an impact on Harris, and could be one reason why she selected Walz — because she was “impressed by his demeanor, how he carried himself.”
Harris noted that, among other things, Walz’s track record on abortion was one of the reasons she chose him as a running mate.
“He worked with Republicans to pass infrastructure investments. He cut taxes for working families. He passed a law to provide paid family and medical leave to Minnesotan families. He made Minnesota the first state in the country to pass a law providing constitutional abortion protections after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and as an avid hunter, he passed a bill requiring universal background checks for gun purchases,” she said, according to Fox News.
