VA-SD07: In one state Senate race, signs of a national struggle over abortion

A special election for the Virginia state Senate is drawing big dollars and national attention in the latest sign of how the abortion issue is driving every level of politics in the post-Roe era.

The January contest to fill the Senate seat vacated by Republican Jen Kiggans, who was elected to Congress in November, does not threaten Democrats’ majority in the chamber. But pro- and anti-abortion rights groups, who are spending tens of thousands of dollars, believe the race could significantly impact people’s ability to access the procedure in the purple state.

Abortion is legal in Virginia until the third trimester, but Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a potential 2024 presidential candidate, has proposed prohibiting the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy in his recently released budget.

Youngkin doesn’t yet have the votes to enact that ban — but Democrats’ narrow majority in the state Senate has put this special election between Virginia Beach City Councilman and former NFL safety Aaron Rouse, a Democrat, and Navy veteran Kevin Adams, a Republican, in the national spotlight.

The frenzy over the state Senate seat — which covers parts of Virginia Beach and Norfolk and was won by Kiggans by 511 votes in 2019 — reveals just how granular pro- and anti-abortion rights groups are getting in the post-Roe era, and is “another proof point that the fight for the future of abortion rights and abortion access is at the state level,” said Andrea Miller, president of the National Institute for Reproductive Health.



https://www.politico.com/news/2022/12/23/virginia-special-election-abortion-battleground-00075298