Stacey Abrams: ‘I was anti-abortion until I went to college’

Stacey Abrams, a vocal supporter of abortion, on Sunday revealed in an interview with CNN’s Dana Bash that she wasn’t previously pro-life, up until she began attending college.

“I’ve thought about my faith a great deal. In fact, I was anti-abortion until I went to college. And there I met a friend who has my shared faith values, but we started having conversations about what reproductive care and abortion care really is. And when I talk about that, it was an experience that I had because she was able to give me a different perspective,” Abrams told Bash.

She continued, explaining that in “next few years, I really started thinking about what role should the legislature play, what role should government play?” She added, “This is health care. This is about a woman’s right to control her body … And that, for me as a matter of faith, means that I don’t impose those values systems on others. More importantly, I protect her rights, I protect her humanity and that should be my responsibility.”

Abrams started off her higher education at Spelman College before transferring to the University of Texas where she earned her Master of Public Affairs degree. She also got her Juris Doctor degree from Yale.

Abrams, whose mother and father are both Methodist pastors, told CNN’s Sara Sidner in late June: “I was very much on the side of anti-abortion, through much of my upbringing. I grew up in Mississippi, in a very religious family, in a religious community. And I was raised to have a very uncritical eye to this question.”

However, she added that “those are religious concerns, or often concerns driven by personal morality. And that should be your choice. But abortion is a medical issue. It is about a medical decision. And there is no place, in that medical decision, for ideology, or for politicians.”

Abrams is currently seeking to unseat Georgia Governor Brian Kemp. This is her second attempt. She previously ran against Kemp in 2018 but lost.