Kamala Harris visits Planned Parenthood clinic
Vice President Kamala Harris toured a Planned Parenthood clinic in Minnesota on Thursday, becoming what is believed to be the first president or vice president ever to visit a clinic that provides abortion services in U.S. history.
Vice President Kamala Harris toured a Planned Parenthood clinic in Minnesota on Thursday, becoming what is believed to be the first president or vice president ever to visit a clinic that provides abortion services in U.S. history.
Sources familiar with Harris’ visit to the St. Paul clinic told NBC News that the vice president wanted to make sure she was meeting with people directly impacted by abortion policies and to connect with them in their spaces. The sources also said the visit is part of a broader strategy by Harris to be traveling and on the ground with Americans as much as possible.
Harris, who has become a prominent voice in the Biden administration on the issue of abortion, said she made the trip to highlight the work happening in such clinics and to hammer home the point that women need more access to reproductive healthcare in the aftermath of the Supreme Court overruling Roe v. Wade.
“In this environment, these attacks against an individual’s right to make decisions about their own body are outrageous, and in many instances just plain old immoral,” Harris said while standing in the lobby of the clinic. “How dare these elected leaders believe they are in a better position to tell women what they need, to tell women what is in their best interest. We have to be a nation that trusts women.”
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at Planned Parenthood Thursday in St. Paul, Minn. Adam Bettcher / APHarris said that, while in the clinic, she met with about two dozen health care workers and praised them for “providing health care in a safe place that gives people dignity.” She also said she wanted to come to St. Paul specifically because in the aftermath of Roe v. Wade being overruled, Minnesota workers have been providing care to an influx of out-of-state patients as states around it have restricted access to abortion.
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