This week, Cosmopolitan Magazine published a feature highlighting five midterm races across the country that matter the most for preserving abortion access and featured the North Carolina General Assembly races as one of them by highlighting several candidates in key swing districts – Senator Sydney Batch, Marcia Morgan, Christy Clark, and Amy Block DeLoach. In the article, Cosmopolitan cites that the outcome of these races could impact abortion access not just in North Carolina, but the entire South.

Read more about the critical importance of North Carolina’s General Assembly races in Cosmopolitan’s full feature and the candidate’s full profiles:

Cosmopolitan Magazine: The North Carolina Legislator Race Could Gravely Impact Abortion Access Across the Entire South

• Right now, North Carolina is considered a critical access point in the South when it comes to reproductive health care. Unlike in many of the neighboring states, abortion—up to 20 weeks—is still legal for North Carolinians and the people who travel there.
• That precious right is hanging on by a thread though, with the state’s Republican state legislative majority holding a big pair of scissors this Election Day.
• The Republican party currently has a majority in both chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly: 69 seats in the state House and 28 in the state Senate. But luckily for those of us who believe in the right to choose, the state’s governor is the vocally pro-choice Democrat Roy Cooper, and he has veto power over any legislation that passes through the assembly.
• Republicans, however, are hoping that this November, they’ll gain even more seats—3 more in the House and 2 in the Senate—thus winning a supermajority, which would allow them to bypass the governor’s veto. Yep, they’d be unstoppable—literally.
• And here’s what they’ve already promised to do with that power, should they nab the supermajority: Speaker of the House Tim Moore said that in 2023, once the midterms are settled, the party will introduce a “heartbeat bill,” which typically limits abortions after 6 weeks, before most people know they are pregnant.
• Such legislation would be devastating for people not only in North Carolina but also across the entire South: In August, more than 33 percent of abortion patients at NC Planned Parenthood centers traveled from other states, up from 14 percent before the Dobbs decision.
• In order to stop Republicans from taking a supermajority in the general assembly, it’s crucial that incumbent Democrats hold on to their seats and that other seats flip to blue.

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