The name of the podcast says a lot.
The “Call Her Daddy” podcast, hosted by Alex Cooper, is a favorite among millions of young women—specifically, Gen Z—with a host that makes a point of discussing sex, especially if those issues are “consider[ed] taboo.”
The podcast’s name reflects “female empowerment,” and apparently originates from a conversation in which former co-host Sofia Franklyn suggested women should be seen as powerful by calling them “daddy” instead of men. Nearly half the audience identifies as Democrat, and some have called the show “X-rated.”
It’s on this intellectually heady podcast (*cough*) that Vice President Kamala Harris decided to make a recent appearance while Hurricane Helene relief efforts labored on. And when she did, Harris repeated a few whoppers on abortion that the Left is no doubt hoping will motivate voters in the hotly contested 2024 presidential election.
Specifically, Harris went back to two tired tropes:
1) Abortion restrictions are resulting in the deaths of women across the country.
2) No babies are being left to die after surviving abortion.
Respectfully, Madam Vice President, both of those representations are false.
The Death of Amber Thurman
Amber Thurman sought an abortion shortly after Georgia’s abortion ban went into effect. Georgia’s LIFE Act took effect after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022 in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision, and banned abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected—generally, around six weeks of pregnancy.
While a state trial court judge struck down the abortion ban Sept. 30, finding that privacy rights under Georgia’s state constitution included the right to make personal health care decisions, that decision was subsequently stayed by the Georgia Supreme Court, which allowed the law to remain in effect in the Peach State for the time being.
Thurman traveled out of state to obtain the abortion pill mifepristone in North Carolina, before returning to her home state of Georgia to take the pill and begin the abortion process.
In the “Call Her Daddy” podcast, Harris said:
And because the other state had been so overwhelmed by all these women coming from all these southern states who couldn’t get treatment in their own state, her, [Thurman] the window for her appointment had closed. So instead of having a surgical procedure, she had medication and basically went back home and then had some complications and went to the hospital because she was bleeding. And they delayed 20 hours before they treated her because here’s the thing that’s so messed up about this. Some of these people will say, whoa, but I do believe in exceptions.
From that relatively nonsensical representation, it seems that Harris was saying that Thurman 1) couldn’t get an appointment on time, and 2) treatment for complications related to her medication abortion was delayed 20 hours after arriving at the hospital.
But here’s the rest of the story.
The Biden-Harris administration deregulated the abortion pill mifepristone in 2021, ostensibly due to the COVID-19 pandemic, making the pill easier to get, more dangerous, and less predictable in its use. Among its changes, the federal government eliminated the requirement of an in-person doctor’s visit to secure the pill, expanded use of the pill from seven to 10 weeks’ gestation, and allowed women to obtain the pills by mail.
For a drug with known, serious potential side effects (including incomplete abortions, severe bleeding, failed abortions, and infection), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s regulatory determinations made a dangerous pill even more dangerous. In fact, the FDA’s own warning label on mifepristone states that complications from using the pill can reach a frequency of between 2.9% and 4.6%.
In 2023 alone, that represents nearly 20,000 emergency room visits for medication abortion patients.
Although Thurman had legally obtained abortion pills in North Carolina to end the lives of her unborn twins, without an ultrasound (something required by the FDA only a few years prior), she couldn’t possibly know she was pregnant with twins, or what the foreseeable complications might be.
After taking the pill, Thurman became sick. Unable to abort the twins, and with their remains still in her uterus, sepsis set in. Thurman went to the hospital where doctors monitored her condition and hospitalized her but gave her antibiotics hours far later than she should have had received them. What’s more, the hospital made her wait 20 hours before performing a dilation and curettage (also known as a D&C) to remove the remaining parts of her unborn twins after the incomplete abortion.
The American Association of Pro-Life OBGYNs said in reaction to the case that “any first-year resident could make” the diagnosis that this was an infection due to an incomplete abortion, the standard of care for which is immediate antibiotics and a dilation and curettage, also known as a D&C.
Every state in the country requires doctors to treat women before, during, or after an abortion in any way necessary to save their lives. And an ultrasound performed immediately upon Thurman’s arrival at the hospital showed no fetal heartbeat. There ought to have been absolutely no question that this was not an abortion of living twins, but rather removal of fetal remains after a failed medication abortion—something absolutely critical to save Thurman’s life.
“Amber Thurman’s state of Georgia clearly allows physicians to intervene in medical emergencies or when there is no detectable fetal heartbeat, both of which applied to her,” Dr. Christina Francis, AAPLOG chief executive, said in a statement. “Don’t be misled by those who advocate for induced abortion over the health and safety of women.”
Thurman’s death was horrific, tragic, and unnecessary, but it was entirely preventable with appropriate medical care administered by even the most novice doctor. And it was directly traceable to the FDA’s determinations to make the abortion pill more accessible—and subsequently, more dangerous.
Babies Left to Die
In the “Call Her Daddy” interview, Harris was asked to “clarify” whether some states are “executing babies after birth.”
She responded:
That is not happening anywhere in the United States. It is not happening, and it’s a lie. Just, it’s a bold-faced lie that he is suggesting that. … Can you imagine? Can you imagine? He is suggesting that women in their ninth month of pregnancy are electing to have an abortion. Are you kidding? That is so outrageously inaccurate, and it’s so insulting to suggest that that would be happening and that women would be doing that. It’s not happening anywhere.
This is a strange refutation coming from Harris, considering the fact that her current vice-presidential running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, repealed the law in his home state that once required lifesaving care be delivered to infants that survive abortion.
After that law’s repeal, five babies were left to die on surgical tables in the state of Minnesota.
And as for the “no abortions in the ninth month” trope, state-by-state statistics and data from the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute refute that claim.
Not only are third-trimester abortions happening in America right now (well past the point of fetal viability), and not only do eight states and the District of Columbia permit abortion on demand for any reason and any time up until birth, but in one year, in the state of Colorado alone, 137 third-trimester abortions were recorded. In the District of Columbia, a local clinic offers abortions up to nearly 32 weeks; in nearby Bethesda, Maryland, another clinic performs abortions up to 35 weeks’ gestation.
So yes, what Harris says isn’t happening is indeed happening.
For a podcast host—and a vice president—who pride themselves on messages of “female empowerment,” both women ought to know that the strongest women always tell the truth.
Heritage is listed for identification purposes only. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect any institutional position for Heritage or its Board of Trustees.
