Michigan’s abortion protections aren’t safe under a 2nd Trump presidency, Emhoff says

President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign held a rally Monday in Southeast Michigan, attempting to draw a sharp contrast between abortion policy under Democrats vs. former President Donald Trump. 

Michiganders may face federal abortion bans with Trump in the White House, even with statewide protections, according to abortion rights advocates and Democratic leaders.

Doug Emhoff, the husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, addressed Monday’s Biden campaign rally in Clawson in Oakland County.

“We’re going to continue to come here to Michigan and spread the word that we’ve got to move forward,” Emhoff told the Advance in an interview. “We cannot move backwards. … People here in Michigan need to know that it is critical to reelect Joe and Kamala to keep the freedoms that they enjoy here in Michigan moving forward.”

U.S. Sen, Debbie Stabenow (D-Lansing), Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-Royal Oak), actor Misha Collins and Kaitlyn Joshua, a Louisianian impacted by abortion bans and working with the Biden campaign, also joined the second gentleman during the rally. 

Monday was the second anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade and resulted in abortion being banned in many states.

Democrats have made reproductive rights a centerpiece issue this election, holding several events this year, many of which featured Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, as well as an ad campaign featuring Joshua.  

“I think a lot of people have been paying attention and are very concerned, and we’re going to start to reach everyone and let people know that they need to be concerned,” Emhoff told the Advance. 

It’s also the week of the first debate between Biden and Trump, the likely Republican nominee for the White House. The Clawson rally offered the Biden campaign an opportunity to showcase their position on reproductive rights ahead of the debate and launch a “pre-debate offensive” against Trump, as the Advance previously reported. 

Earlier in the day, Emhoff and Stabenow spoke at an event in Flint marking the Dobbs decision. And the Women’s March Michigan organized an abortion rights rally at the Michigan Capitol.

“Women’s lives across this country are at stake,” Joshua said. “While Michiganders are proudly pro-choice, with voters passing important protections for reproductive rights in 2022, no one in this state would be safe under a second Trump presidency.”

“The path to the Oval Office absolutely runs through Michigan,” she said. 

Michigan will be an important state for either candidate to secure in order to gain enough electoral votes and win the presidency. Trump defeated Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in Michigan in 2016, but Biden beat the former president in 2020.

“Michigan, you are the epicenter of this battle, because you are one of the most important swing states, and you may hold the keys to a second Biden Harris administration that will protect women’s health care, will protect the environment, will prevent billionaires from getting more tax cuts at the expense of working Americans,” Collins said.

In 2022, abortion right advocates organized a ballot drive for a constitutional amendment guaranteeing the right to an abortion. The amendment passed in November and Whitmer was reelected, along with a Democratic majority in both the House and the Senate for the first time in almost 40 years. 

Although abortion is legal in Michigan, speakers at the Clawson rally emphasized that reproductive rights could be stripped at the federal level with Trump in the White House and GOP majorities in Congress. The speakers framed a Trump presidency as an existential threat to reproductive rights.

“Anyone who wants a baby, a pregnancy or anyone who needs to make choices about pregnancies, no matter who you are, it’s your decision to do that,” Stabenow said. “Our president and vice president understand that to their core and believe in that.”  

Emhoff told the Advance that states like Michigan that have legalized abortion are still vulnerable if Trump wins.

“Yes, they are protecting those rights right now, but that’s all in play if Donald Trump comes back,” Emhoff said. 

Benson asked rally participants to reconnect with their emotions from two years ago, when federal abortion protections were overturned, and continue to vote for candidates supporting reproductive rights. She pointed to the result in Michigan: abortion protections in the constitution and a Democratic trifecta. 

“When we think about how we felt on this day, two years ago, let’s also connect to the energy that followed,” Benson said. “That energy that changed our state for the better.”

Reproductive rights limitations don’t stop at banning abortion, Stabenow said. She noted GOP lawmakers blocking legislation protecting reproductive health care services like IVF and contraception. Emhoff pointed out Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion in Dobbs, which called into question other protections, like same-sex marriage and birth control, legally secured by the right to privacy.

Emhoff also spoke about his experience campaigning for reproductive rights, explaining that everyone, not just people directly impacted by the bans, should care about abortion protections.  

“I do it because it’s the right thing to do,” Emhoff said. “Because women should not be treated as less than. Women must have the same exact rights that men do.”

This story was originally published by the Michigan Advance