![Kamala Harris said extremists in the US are attacking women’s freedoms](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/world-news/2023/12/19/TELEMMGLPICT000359022054_17030189335040_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqZ8mW8HiEERO2qHpFmSdqSpL3qvmoCuDH8eyBr7XSLnk.jpeg?imwidth=680)
Kamala Harris to launch abortion tour as issue becomes election battleground
The US Vice-President will front a campaign as Democrats target a political weak point for the Republicans
![Kamala Harris said extremists in the US are attacking women’s freedoms](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/world-news/2023/12/19/TELEMMGLPICT000359022054_17030189335040_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqZ8mW8HiEERO2qHpFmSdqSpL3qvmoCuDH8eyBr7XSLnk.jpeg?imwidth=680)
US Vice-President Kamala Harris will next month launch a nationwide tour on abortion access as the Democrats prepare to capitalise on the issue ahead of the 2024 election.
The “fight for reproductive freedoms” tour will include events across the country and feature women impacted by the Supreme Court’s decision last year to reverse Roe v Wade, ending the nationwide right to abortion.
Ms Harris’s tour will kick off in swing state Wisconsin on 22 January, the 51st anniversary of the original Roe decision.
“Extremists across our country continue to wage a full-on attack against hard-won, hard-fought freedoms as they push their radical policies – from banning abortion in all 50 states and criminalising doctors, to forcing women to travel out of state in order to get the care they need,” she said in a statement.
Earlier this year Ms Harris carried out a tour of universities in a bid to win over younger voters.
It comes as Joe Biden, who is staring down the barrel of record low approval ratings on issues such as the economy, plans to make abortion rights a central part of his campaign as the issue shapes up to be a political weak point for Republicans.
His team are understood to believe abortion access will motivate voters including suburban women, older women and some younger men.
Each of the seven state-wide ballot questions about reproductive rights since 2022 have yielded victory for abortion rights advocates, including in conservative states such as Ohio, Kansas and Kentucky.
Voter backlash was also widely credited with limiting Republican gains in the 2022 congressional midterm elections, as well as propelling Democrats in November to victories in Virginia and Kentucky.
Several of the Republican candidates support banning abortion. Ron DeSantis signed a six-week abortion ban in Florida, and Nikki Haley has said she would have done the same.
While Donald Trump has been more lenient, saying he supports abortion under certain circumstances, he has taken credit for ending Roe v Wade by appointing three conservative justices to the Supreme Court.
Earlier this year the Democratic National Committee rolled out a six-figure advert campaign which included putting Mr Biden and Ms Harris’s photograph on a billboard alongside the text: “NO to Republican Abortion Bans! YES to a Women’s Right to Choose!”