Women affected by GOP abortion ban speak out ahead of Trump-Harris election

On Monday, while campaigning for Vice President Kamala Harris, Michelle Obama delivered a rallying cry to American men: The lives of the women you love are at stake in this election.

At an event in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the former first lady spoke directly to the men in the crowd and explained how strict abortion bans could put their girlfriends in legal jeopardy, leave their mothers without access to life-saving cancer screenings, and make their daughters afraid to call the doctor if they experience complications during an unexpected pregnancy. For some across America, these hypothetical situations have already become a reality. Since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision in 2022, many women have come forward with stories about the harrowing experience of being pregnant in post-Roe America. On Tuesday, “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski sat down with three of these women to discuss how Republican-backed abortion bans left them fighting for their lives.

In November 2022, Deborah Dorbert, a mother from Florida, was five months pregnant with her second child when she learned her baby had a rare condition that was likely to cause death shortly after birth. Due to the state’s strict abortion ban, doctors refused to allow Dorbert to terminate the pregnancy, forcing her to carry the baby to term.

The Florida mother spoke with Brzezinski about the physical and mental toll those months took on her and her family.

“I fell into a deep depression and started having suicidal thoughts,” Dorbert said. “I endured physical pain worse than the birth itself and I fell into a deep, dark place, both physically and mentally, trying to understand (and) prepare for the birth – because I faced life and death on the same day .”

Dorbert told how she was forced to explain the situation to her 4-year-old son. “He asks questions: What is an angel? Where did his brother go? What is heaven? Does he have toys? And I tell him, I don’t know.” Kaitlyn Joshua, a mother from Louisiana, was also denied care in 2022 due to her state’s abortion restrictions. Kaitlyn and her husband, Landon, were excited to welcome another baby into their family, but unfortunately, just over 10 weeks into her pregnancy, she suffered a miscarriage.

Joshua said two emergency rooms in the state refused to offer her care because the procedures she needed to manage her miscarriage are also used for elective abortions. Instead, a nurse offered to hold the mother in her prayers.

“I’m a Christian woman, a woman of faith, and at that moment I didn’t want or need prayers. I needed access to abortion care,” she told Brzezinski.

Amanda Zurawski, a Texas mother who made headlines for suing the state in 2023 after she was denied an abortion, also joined the panel. She told Dorbert and Joshua that she was proud of them for speaking up and acknowledged that the pain of their experiences will never truly go away.

“These conversations are not easy,” she told Brzezinski. “They don’t get any easier. They never get easier. We have suffered enormous grief, trauma, loss – those things stay with you forever.” At the end of the interview, Brzezinski asked the women why they chose to speak out now, in the final days of the election.

“I’m speaking to share my son’s legacy,” Dorbert said. “To help bring the change so no one has to go through what I went through.”

Joshua added: “For me as a woman of color, as a black woman, I have to say that I speak for all the women of color who are like me. They don’t necessarily want to be on the front lines and share their story — and why should they that? That’s why I’m here to make sure I amplify their voices.”

“I help people connect the dots,” she continued. “And understand that this could be you too if we don’t do what we have to do on November 5th.”

Zurawski then echoed the words of the former first lady: “For the people who think this can be niche, you’re not going to care when it’s your mother, your sister, your wife, your aunt. We have to stop the suffering.”