As medical perils from abortion bans grow, so do opportunities for Democrats in a post-Roe world

Light illuminates part of the Supreme Court building at dusk on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 16, 2022.

Patrick Semansky / Patrick Semansky

For much of her life, Angela Crawford considered herself a fairly conservative Republican — and she voted that way. But then a wave of court rulings and Republican-led actions in states restricted abortion and later in vitro fertilization, the very procedure that had helped her conceive her daughter.

Now, Crawford, 38, is working to gather signatures in her home state of Missouri for a ballot initiative in the fall that would enshrine access to abortion and other reproductive health care. And she’s voting for Democrats.

“I wish everyone would realize how big this topic is,” Crawford said of reproductive rights. “People really minimized it initially, because they didn’t realize the scope.”