Should there be any limits on when someone has an abortion or why someone has an abortion in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts?
WBZ political analyst Jon Keller asked a form of this question when moderating his channel’s attorney general debate over the weekend.
He posed the question to former Boston city councilor Andrea Campbell of Mattapan, the Democrat in the race.
Keller started the debate by asking her “Do you believe there are any reasonable limits on abortion rights and if so, what are they?”
Campbell didn’t name any restrictions she supports on abortion, instead calling herself “100 percent pro-choice.”
“I am 100 percent for a woman’s right to choose,” Campbell said. “I have been stressing on the campaign trail why people should care about the attorney general race, and this is one very reason. The fact that the Supreme Court could take away a Constitutional protection, that means other civil rights that we probably take for granted are under threat.”
“This is a major role for an AG to play and this one major distinction between me and my opponent, who is against a woman’s right to choose, who is against a fundamental right that we’ve taken for granted for a long time and that we should be protecting and fighting for,” Campbell later added, referring to Bourne attorney Jay McMahon, the Republican nominee for state attorney general.
McMahon responded to Campbell by describing differences between the Massachusetts Constitution and the United States Constitution. He noted that abortion in the United States is now generally a state issue, and that the federal constitution, which does not mention abortion, does not protect abortion rights.
The Massachusetts Constitution doesn’t mention abortion, either, but the state’s higher court has ruled that it provides a right to abortion. McMahon said he would uphold the state constitution as so interpreted if elected.
McMahon said:
Let me just say this: the Dobbs decision does not affect a woman’s right in Massachusetts, not one iota. That right to choose is already enshrined in the state constitution. The Dobbs case was on the federal constitution and what the Dobbs decision said is that in the federal constitution, there is not a federally protected civil right to abortion. But on the Massachusetts state constitution, it is enshrined that a woman has a right to choose. When I become the attorney general, I’m going to take an oath of office that I’m going to uphold the constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the laws thereunder, and the law now is that a woman has a right to choose. So where she said I’m against that, I don’t know. It doesn’t say that on any of my social media. It’s just part of a Democratic playbook where they say every Republican is against something, and that’s not so.
The Dobbs that McMahon referred to is the June 24, 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In the case, the Supreme Court voted 6-3 against an abortion clinic in Mississippi, and 5-4 to give states greater control over abortion laws, including control over gestational limits; the decision overturned both Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.
The attorney general race will be decided on election day, which is Tuesday, November 8. It’s an open seat race, since the incumbent, Maura Healey, a Democrat, is running for governor.
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Andrea Campbell 
