RALEIGH, N.C. — Abortion remains a key part of North Carolina Democrats’ election playbook, which for 2024 will include what abortion rights advocates will call an unprecedented investment in get-out-the-vote efforts.
Planned Parenthood-affiliated groups in North Carolina on Thursday announced a $10 million campaign in the state that will largely focus on convincing people concerned about limiting access to abortion to vote in November.
According to representatives from Planned Parenthood Votes and Planned Parenthood Action PAC North Carolina, the spending seeks to end the Republican Party’s supermajority in the General Assembly that passed new abortion limits last year and defeat Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson, who wants the law to be more restrictive.
The $10 million marks the largest campaign investment ever made by Planned Parenthood entities in North Carolina, said Emily Thompson, spokesperson for Planned Parenthood Votes.
“Our goal is clear: to protect access to abortion in North Carolina, we must make sure voters know abortion is on the agenda this year,” Thompson said at a news conference near the state Legislative Building .
The money will pay for digital advertising, phone banking, mailings and media programming on college campuses. It will also support Planned Parenthood’s goal of knocking on 1 million doors across the state before the election, Thompson said.
Most of the campaign efforts will focus on New Hanover, Wake, Mecklenburg and Buncombe counties as part of the broader statewide strategy, Thompson said. The four counties were chosen in part because of Planned Parenthood’s health services in those regions and its ongoing organization.
The Republican Party-controlled state Legislature passed a 2023 bill over Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto, tightening the state’s ban on most abortions from after 20 weeks of pregnancy to 12 weeks, with additional exceptions.
“These lawmakers did not consider us, our rights or our freedoms,” said Planned Parenthood organizer Emma Horst-Martz. “They showed us what awaits us when they are the ones who decide our future.”
Several speakers Thursday specifically mentioned Robinson’s past comments on abortion. Horst-Martz called him the ‘worst perpetrator in the attacks on abortion’.
Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein — who is also running for governor and is a strong supporter of abortion rights — and his allies say Robinson’s comments show he wants a complete abortion ban.
Robinson’s campaign has said he supports an abortion ban after about six weeks of pregnancy — which is before many women know they are pregnant — with some exceptions.
In addition to a focus on defeating Robinson in November, Thompson said the groups will also target 16 state legislative races to break the Republican supermajority in both legislative chambers.
A few weeks before the 2022 election, Planned Parenthood affiliates announced a $5 million investment to influence more than a dozen legislative races to try to preserve Cooper’s veto.
In the November 2022 elections, Republicans initially lost one seat in the House because they had veto-proof majorities in both chambers of the General Assembly. But they reached the threshold in April 2023 when then-Democratic Rep. Tricia Cotham switched to the Republicans. That led to changes in response to the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade.
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Associated Press writer Gary Robertson in Raleigh contributed to this report.
