The 2024 presidential election is fast approaching, and Jennifer Lawrence is the latest celebrity to explain why Kamala Harris has her vote.
“Abortion is literally on the ballot,” the Oscar-winning actor told People this week, describing the current Vice President as an “amazing candidate.” “I know that she will do whatever she can to protect reproductive rights.”
As I’m sure you know, Kamala has consistently supported legislation to restore the right to abortions across the US after Roe v. Wade — a landmark legal ruling that protected the constitutional right to abortions since 1973 — was overturned in June 2022.
“You want to talk about this is what people wanted?” Kamala said at the presidential debate last month while condemning state-level abortion bans. “Pregnant women who want to carry a pregnancy to term, suffering from a miscarriage, being denied care in an emergency room because health care providers are afraid they might go to jail and she’s bleeding out in a car in the parking lot?”
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Referring to Kamala’s Republican opponent, former president Donald Trump, Jennifer made her stance clear, saying: “That’s the most important thing, is to not let somebody into the White House who is going to ban abortion.”
For context, Jennifer has previously talked openly about growing up in a conservative home in Kentucky. In fact, during an interview with Vogue, which took place days after Roe v. Wade was overturned, she revealed she previously fell out with family members over their Republican beliefs.
“I just worked so hard in the last five years to forgive my dad and my family and try to understand: It’s different. The information they are getting is different. Their life is different,” she said, talking about a “rift” in her family prompted by the 2016 presidential election.
“I’ve tried to get over it and I really can’t. I can’t. I’m sorry I’m just unleashing, but I can’t fuck with people who aren’t political anymore,” she said. “You live in the United States of America. You have to be political. It’s too dire. Politics are killing people.”
Discussing women’s reproductive rights specifically, Jennifer said at the time: “I don’t want to disparage my family, but I know that a lot of people are in a similar position with their families. How could you raise a daughter from birth and believe that she doesn’t deserve equality? How?”
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Now, the Hunger Games star is using her platform to produce documentaries shining a light on women’s rights, emphasizing the importance of education through storytelling during her interview with People.
“That’s the beautiful, amazing thing about film and documentaries,” she told the outlet. “Hearing facts or listening to the news, hearing certain things happen, it’s very easy to forget until you actually see human existence and you see what’s going on. I think that’s when minds can be changed.”
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Jennifer’s company, Excellent Cadaver, has produced two as-yet-unreleased documentary films: Bread and Roses, which follows “three women in real time as they fight to recover their autonomy” living under Taliban rule in Afghanistan, and Zurawski v Texas, which is about the women involved in a 2023 lawsuit against the state of Texas over restrictive abortion laws.
Talking more about Zurawski v Texas — also co-produced by Hillary and Chelsea Clinton — Jen said that the women in the film “have gone through what no human being should ever, ever endure.”
“Women are dying,” she said, hoping that the documentary will “enlighten people’s idea of what abortion is and why certain people need abortions — and why it’s so important to keep lawmakers out of families and out of people’s doctors’ offices.”
“These laws are made by random white men and they’re not made by healthcare providers,” she added.
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In conclusion, Jennifer once again urged people to “take action by voting,” saying, “The most important thing that we can do right now is just vote.”
You can read more about Jennifer and the documentaries she produced in the full People article here.
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