Speaking in Selma, Alabama, on the 59th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, Vice President Kamala Harris drew parallels between the Civil Rights Movement, the rights to bodily autonomy and the right to start a family.
“Freedom is fundamental to the promise of America,” Harris told a crowd of hundreds gathered near the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where baton-wielding state troopers confronted marchers demanding Black voting rights in 1965. “Freedom is not to be given. It is not to be bestowed. It is ours by right.”
Harris spoke about the recent Alabama Supreme Court decision that frozen embryos were entitled to the same protections as children and what it could mean for those who want to start families.
“This generation has fewer rights than their mothers and grandmothers,” she said. “The government should not be telling her what to do with her body.”
She also told the crowd she supports a ceasefire in Gaza while reiterating her support for Israel to “defend itself.”
“What we are seeing every day in Gaza is devastating,” she said. “Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed. … As I have said repeatedly since Oct. 7, Israel has a right to defend itself. Hamas cannot control Gaza, and the threat Hamas poses to the people of Israel must be eliminated.”
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