Planned Parenthood’s president and CEO Alexis McGill Johnson campaigned for the Harris/ Walz campaign across the commonwealth this past weekend.
With stops in Philadelphia, the Main Line suburbs of Philadelphia and Allentown, she jumped around the state promoting reproductive freedom on behalf of the campaign.
Planned Parenthood Action, the official political arm of the organization, officially endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president and other Democrats up and down the ballot, from congressional to statewide races. In Pennsylvania, they’ve endorsed candidates such as state Rep. Eddie Day Pashinski and U.S. Rep. Susan Wild.
With 15 minutes left of her ride from the Main Line to Allentown, she spoke with WVIA News about the work she’s doing heading into Election Day, now less than a month away.
During the one-on-one phone interview with McGill Johnson, she discussed Pennsylvania’s role in this election, the stakes for reproductive healthcare, how to engage disillusioned voters and more.
Highlights of that conversation, edited for length and clarity, follow.
Q: What brings you to Pennsylvania this weekend?
A: I am here campaigning for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. We started off this morning near Philadelphia in a canvass launch with a rousing group of Saturday morning volunteers sharing stories about abortion and understanding what was at stake in this moment. Then I headed over to Bryn Mawr to kick off a screening of the new documentary Zurawski v Texas, which follows the stories of a number of Texas women who are suing the state because the impact that Trump's abortion bans have had on their lives and their health and their family. And now I'm on my way to Allentown, pulling in to do some more rallying. I'll close out the day with the youth rally.
Q: How vulnerable are reproductive rights in Pennsylvania?
A: Pennsylvania is one of the states that does have critical abortion access, and in fact, has access that allows Pennsylvania to serve many patients coming from outside of the state.We know if Donald Trump and JD Vance get into the White House that they will enact a national abortion ban. Project 2025 has laid out a plan for them to ban access to medication abortion and put in a number of other restrictive and surveillance measures in order to control our bodies and our lives. They can do it through executive action.
I think that's what's quite alarming, that right now we are living in a world where 20 states and counting have these abortion bans and significant restrictions, and they are willing to ensure that the rest of the country becomes quite like what's happening in banned states.
Q: What misconceptions about reproductive health, women’s rights and Planned Parenthood do you see through this election cycle?
A: We've seen all kinds of misinformation around access to reproductive health care, and there are questions around whether or not access to abortion creates other kinds of harms. We know that Americans, by and large, support access to reproductive care. At no point in pregnancy do they believe that politicians are more qualified than doctors or women to make decisions about their own bodies.
I think that's the fundamental difference that you're seeing between the two campaigns. There's just a strong contrast between people who believe that women and doctors should make decisions about their own bodies and their own lives, and politicians who think they know better. This campaign is about trusting women and ensuring that they have access to the information they need, and letting doctors and providers be the source of information that people need.
Q: If Donald Trump wins, is there a concern over the future of Planned Parenthood and its funding?
A: JD Vance has talked about defunding Planned Parenthood, just in recent weeks. We are always subject to attacks whenever you have someone like Donald Trump in office. Planned Parenthood is so popular. One out of four people has been to Planned Parenthood in their lifetime, and defunding Planned Parenthood is akin to taking away excellent quality health care for millions of patients.
Obviously, we always are concerned when we are not able to serve the maximum amount of patients that we could, because we know that Planned Parenthood health centers serve and provide life saving care for so many Americans, breast cancer screenings, family planning, STI tests, and, of course, abortion where we can.
Anytime there is a threat or attack on Planned Parenthood, it is essentially attacking women's health, sexual and reproductive health care, and we also know Americans won't stand for it.
Q: Beyond reproductive healthcare, what other services does Planned Parenthood provide that are important to women and families that would be lost if funding was taken away?
A: Planned Parenthood health centers that are run by incredible leadership here in the state of Pennsylvania, those workers show up every day on the front lines, and they are fighting for the care of so many Pennsylvanians. They're also on the front lines of fighting fascism. They're fighting against people trying to take those decisions away from them.
So what happens in many states when these abortion bans come into play? We are also seeing people being subject to protests and attacks just for going into a health center to get access to birth control, to get access to gender affirming care, to get access to those breast cancer screenings and just conversations with experts and sex education experts who can help them make and plan their their decisions and their futures.
Planned Parenthood is a critical part of the public health infrastructure. Health infrastructure, and anytime it is under threat, anytime any health care provider is under threat or is in fear of criminalization for providing basic care, it undermines health care in a community.
Q: How do you appeal to voters who are disillusioned because of issues like the war in the Middle East?
A: I think the fight for reproductive freedom is a bellwether for other fights for freedoms all across the globe. We know that the number of countries across the globe that are descending into fascism, the first thing they do is literally strip away the rights of half the country by controlling reproductive health care, and we have seen it since the Trump administration, the direct attacks that have happened at the federal level, in state houses across the country, that have been backed up with our judiciary all the way over the Supreme Court.
When you see those institutions get captured and allow these kinds of bans to create the harms that they have, remember. We know now that at least two women have lost their lives due to Trump's abortion bans. We know that is just a canary in the coal mine for the other freedoms that are about to be taken away.
So I would urge Pennsylvanians across the spectrum, because I don't think this is a partisan issue, to think about how important it is to save our democracy and ensure that people are not losing access to basic fundamental freedoms. I think that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz best represent that fight for freedom. I think they're the ones that are really allowing us to choose freedom in ways that Donald Trump and JD Vance simply aren't.
That's not the world that I want my 12 and 15 year old girls to grow up in. So I would urge them to think about the future. I would urge them to think about the kind of harms that are happening right here, right now in their communities, and vote to protect access to freedom.
Q: What are the stakes of this election up and down the ballot?
A: A nationwide abortion ban is on the ballot. So whatever protections exist here in Pennsylvania will be undone by a national abortion ban at the same time. If we elect Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, we have an opportunity to restore reproductive freedom across the country.
There is no world where I should wake up in New York one day, come to Pennsylvania and then go to Georgia the next day, and my rights are completely different. There's no world where my daughters go to visit their family members in North Carolina and suddenly they have less rights, or they choose to go to college in Texas, and suddenly they have less rights.
What is important here and what is important to understand about freedom and protecting freedom, is that it should be universal, no matter where you live. Unfortunately, what has happened with the Dobbs decision has given us insight into what a world looks like when you have free states and not free states. Our job is to protect every single American and ensure that they have freedom wherever they go.
