Rick Jackson, a Republican gubernatorial candidate in Georgia, appears to believe women should have to prove they were raped before being eligible for an abortion exception under the state's six-week ban, according to leaked audio reviewed by HuffPost. While speaking with a community member at an annual barbecue event in April, Jackson discussed his views on abortion, including the state's current six-week abortion ban.
Details of the Leaked Audio
The law only allows exceptions for victims of rape and incest, when the fetus is not able to survive outside of the womb, and when the life or health of a pregnant person is at risk. Jackson, a billionaire Republican political donor, agreed with the community member who said 'two wrongs don't make a right' regarding rape victims accessing abortion care. Just a month before this conversation, Jackson supported abortion exceptions for rape or incest victims in a publicly shared questionnaire created by anti-abortion group the Georgia Life Alliance Committee, the state affiliate of the National Right to Life.
When the community member said she wanted to see 'babies born no matter how they were conceived,' referring to rape, Jackson replied: 'You still got life, it's still a life.' He then agreed with her when she said a woman who says she was raped 'needs to prove it' to be eligible for an exception under the state's already-extreme abortion ban. The support to 'prove' rape is a sentiment widely shared in anti-abortion circles, which believe unfounded claims that women use rape exceptions as loopholes to access abortion care.
Legal and Social Implications
The state's abortion law exceptions allow for abortion care up to 20 weeks gestation for rape or incest victims who report the crime to law enforcement. Most victims of sexual violence (two out of three) don't report to law enforcement. To prove a person was raped can take months, if not years, in criminal court, and historically the criminal justice system has not treated sexual assault survivors fairly: 98% of perpetrators of sexual violence walk free.
Jackson's Stance on Abortion Pills and Criminalization
In the leaked audio, Jackson also called to 'tighten up' access to abortion pills, which account for over 80% of abortions in the state. Medication abortion is still accessible in person before six weeks or by mail when prescribed by physicians in non-restricted states. One of the two drugs used in medication abortion, mifepristone, has been at the center of anti-abortion fights because people are still able to access abortion care despite state abortion bans.
The gubernatorial candidate said in the same conversation he would be open to criminalizing doctors for performing abortions outside of the state's six-week ban and suggested doctors need to 'prove that the pregnancy was the right number of weeks' because 'doctors are not going to risk their licenses.' Georgia law already criminalizes doctors who offer abortion care outside of the legal limit, classifying an illegal abortion as a felony that carries up to 10 years in prison.
Broader Context and Consequences
Jackson's comments, while notable, are perhaps unsurprising, considering he said in March that he would support a total abortion ban if it landed on his desk as governor. Though total abortion bans with no exceptions are seen as totalitarian, in practice they don't really work. A 2024 study revealed that rape caused around 65,000 pregnancies in states with abortion bans, and authors found that 'rape exceptions fail to provide reasonable access to abortion for survivors.' Criminal penalties also make it harder for physicians to provide emergency care in cases of pregnancy complications or miscarriage.
Despite the state's exceptions for life and health of the mother, at least two women — Amber Thurman and Candi Miller — died because Georgia's abortion ban prevented them from receiving life-saving care for pregnancy complications.
