Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is holding “Trump abortion bans” responsible for the tragic death of Amber Nicole Thurman, a 28-year-old pregnant mother from Georgia.
Thurman died two years ago after delays in receiving critical medical care, which doctors attributed to Georgia’s restrictive abortion laws.
Harris issued a statement on Tuesday following a report from investigative outlet ProPublica, which revealed that Thurman’s death was ruled “preventable” by a state committee of 10 doctors.
Harris, speaking to the National Association of Black Journalists, highlighted Thurman’s case as an example of the consequences of abortion bans enacted after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022.
“This young mother should be alive, raising her son, and pursuing her dream of attending nursing school,” Harris said in her statement. “This is exactly what we feared when Roe was struck down. In more than 20 states, Trump abortion bans are preventing doctors from providing basic medical care.”
Thurman, a medical assistant and mother of a six-year-old son, was taken to Piedmont Henry Hospital in 2022 after suffering severe complications from an abortion.
Doctors discovered that some fetal tissue remained in her uterus and that she required a procedure called dilation and curettage (D&C) to remove it.
However, Georgia’s newly passed abortion law made the procedure a felony, leading to delays in her care. Thurman died 20 hours later on the operating table.
Harris condemned the restrictions, stating:
“Women are bleeding out in parking lots, turned away from emergency rooms, losing their ability to ever have children again. And now women are dying. These are the consequences of Donald Trump’s actions.”
Thurman’s death has sparked renewed debate over the impact of abortion bans across the U.S. Harris directly linked the death to Donald Trump’s appointment of three conservative justices—Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett—who formed the Supreme Court majority that overturned Roe v. Wade.
Following the ruling, many states, including Georgia, quickly implemented laws restricting abortion access, with devastating effects for women like Thurman.
