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North Carolina\u2019s Republican-led legislature has officially passed a 12-week abortion ban, after overturning Governor\u00a0Roy Cooper<\/strong>\u2019s veto. The Tuesday night vote served as a stunning final act to what has been a closely watched clash between Cooper, a Democrat, and North Carolina Republicans over the bill\u2014including a recent Democrat-to-Republican convert, who, despite a long pro-abortion-rights record, voted for the ban. The conclusion\u2014a cut to abortion access for not only North Carolinians, but also for the many women in neighboring states with even harsher restrictions\u2014has re-emboldened Democrats nationally to bring a blue wave to the state.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe dangerous antics by the North Carolina Republican Party are the national model for how to lose elections in 2023 and 2024,\u201d\u00a0Philip Shulman,<\/strong> a spokesperson for liberal super PAC American Bridge 21st Century, said. \u201cAs Republican legislators and the party\u2019s top choice for governor,\u00a0Mark Robinson,<\/strong>\u00a0attack and take away people\u2019s basic freedoms, voters have that much more reason to vote for Democrats up and down the ticket.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNorth Carolina is a battleground state for 2024,\u201d\u00a0Jesse Ferguson,<\/strong>\u00a0a veteran Democratic strategist\u00a0tweeted<\/a>\u00a0after the vote. \u201cGOP candidate is gonna own this.\u201d<\/p>\n Going into Tuesday\u2019s vote, it was unclear whether Republicans could garner enough votes to trump Cooper\u2019s opposition to the bill. \u201cThis is a very purple state, every battle is won or lost on a very tiny, tiny number of votes,\u201d\u00a0Jenny Black,<\/strong> the CEO and president of Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, told\u00a0Vanity Fair<\/em>\u00a0Monday evening. This played out the same way. The Senate voted 30 to 20 along party lines to override Cooper\u2019s veto and the House also voted to override the veto in a final vote of\u00a072 to 48; four Republicans who had previously said they did not favor tighter abortion restrictions supported the ban.\u00a0<\/p>\n “North Carolinians now understand that Republicans are unified in their assault on women\u2019s reproductive freedom and we are energized to fight back on this and other critical issues facing our state,” Cooper said in a statement following the vote Tuesday night.\u00a0<\/p>\n The political calculus around abortion rights in North Carolina changed last month when House member\u00a0Tricia Cotham<\/strong>\u00a0defected from the Democratic ranks<\/a>, providing Republicans with a slim supermajority. Previously an ardent supporter of abortion rights, Cotham voted for the 12-week ban.\u00a0Her\u00a0hypocrisy on the issue<\/a> has been glaring. \u201cMy womb and my uterus is not up for your political grab,\u201d she declared in a 2015 speech. Among the three other Republicans\u2014House representatives\u00a0Ted Davis<\/strong> and\u00a0John Bradford,<\/strong>\u00a0and state senator\u00a0Michael Lee<\/strong>\u2014who also staked out positions on the campaign trail against extreme abortion bans, two voted (Lee and Bradford) for the initial measure, and one (Davis) was absent. As\u00a0Rolling Stone<\/em>\u00a0reported<\/a>, just last year Bradford said he had \u201cno intentions\u201d of making North Carolina\u2019s current 20-week abortion ban more restrictive. Similarly, in an op-ed, Lee staked out, \u201cI am against bans in the first trimester.\u201d And Davis said, \u201cI believe in the [existing] law\u2026. If a woman desires to have an abortion up to 20 weeks, which is the second trimester of pregnancy, she can have an abortion.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Cooper has served as a bulwark against North Carolina Republicans\u2019 conservative agenda for years now; the Democratic governor\u00a0has vetoed more than 75 pieces<\/a> of legislation since he took office in 2017. His veto, which he issued Saturday in Raleigh to a crowd of hundreds, was expected.\u00a0\u201cStanding in the way of progress right now is this Republican supermajority legislature that only took 48 hours to turn the clock back 50 years,\u201d\u00a0Cooper said<\/a>. The governor spent the\u00a0last week campaigning<\/a> in Republican districts to urge constituents to sway their elected leaders.<\/p>\n Black was hoping the political pressures would work. \u201cNovember wasn\u2019t that long ago,\u201d she said ahead of Tuesday. Instead,\u00a0this episode once again thrust North Carolina into Democrats\u2019 purview nationally. A Democratic presidential candidate hasn\u2019t won the state since\u00a0Barack Obama<\/strong> in 2008 (Mitt Romney<\/strong>\u00a0won the state in 2012). And despite Cooper\u2019s victory in 2016 and hopes that\u00a0Donald Trump<\/strong>\u2019s drag on the GOP would help Democrats claim a Senate seat\u2014or two\u2014Republicans have held a mostly firm grasp on the state federally. Still, abortion has proven to be a salient issue for voters, even in much redder states than North Carolina. With that and\u00a0Joe Biden<\/strong>\u2019s wider appeal in southern states, Democrats appear to be more hopeful about their prospects.\u00a0<\/p>\n Republicans pitched the 12-week ban as something of a compromise on the abortion issue. For instance, Republican senator Phil Berger<\/strong>\u00a0characterized the bill<\/a> as \u201ca mainstream approach to limiting elective abortions.\u201d But Democrats and abortion rights activists have dismissed this line of argument. \u201cMake no mistake: Your actions today will harm women,\u201d Representative\u00a0Julie von Haefen,<\/strong> a Democrat, said on the House floor.\u00a0And a Meredith poll<\/a> in February showed that 57% of respondents supported the state\u2019s current 20-week ban or expanding access further.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n