Sign up for the We the Texans newsletter to receive twice-monthly updates on our year-long initiative dedicated to boosting civic engagement and chronicling how democracy is experienced in Texas.
CHICAGO — Amanda Zurawski didn’t want to go into politics. She wanted a baby girl.
Her name would have been Willow. But when Zurwaski was 18 weeks pregnant, her water broke. The fetus wouldn’t survive, but, citing Texas’ abortion laws, her doctors refused to terminate the pregnancy until she eventually developed sepsis three days later.
After nearly dying Zurawski sued the state over its abortion laws and lost, but captured the attention of the nation. Now, she’s at the forefront of Democrats’ battle against anti-abortion legislation and leaning into a new and unexpected path for herself, born out of an anger over her own experience and a desire for change.
“My future is going to be in the political world. I just don’t know what it looks like yet,” said Zurawski, who quit her job earlier this year to focus on the presidential campaign. She’s not ruling out running for office herself.
As Democrats continue to lean into abortion as one of the central pillars of their messaging this cycle, Zurawski has ballooned into one of the party’s most prominent messengers on reproductive rights. She has crisscrossed the country on behalf of the Democratic presidential campaign telling her story of losing her pregnancy and confronting Texas’ restrictive abortion laws. She spoke during counterprogramming to the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee and on the main stage of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. She was a delegate for Texas as the party formally nominated Vice President Kamala Harris for president.
“I’m very proud of everything I’ve done. I’m very hopeful, and I think that we are making change,” Zurawski said in an interview last week amid a packed schedule at the DNC. But she added, “I would trade my personal platform to have Willow.”
Zurawski, who grew up in Indiana but lives in Austin, had practically no political experience or ambitions before her pregnancy. Her résumé included work as a teacher, a gig with Austin FC and most recently, a job with the employment search platform Indeed.
Zurawski had voted Democratic in the past, dating to when she was in college. But she never expected to dive so deeply into politics, let alone becoming a national figure speaking on a convention stage broadcast to millions of viewers.
Before she filed her lawsuit, she shared her story on the campaign trail in October as a volunteer for Beto O’Rourke’s 2022 gubernatorial campaign against Gov. Greg Abbott.
When she first shared her story in 2022, Zurawski expected “maybe one or two people would see it and maybe they’d talk about it for a day or two, and then it would just kind of dissipate.”
Then in 2023, Zurawski and four other women filed a suit, arguing Texas’ law was ambiguous, blocking medically necessary care for women who had pregnancy complications. In Zurawski’s case, her infection after being denied an abortion left her in critical condition and permanently damaged a fallopian tube, hurting her chances of being able to conceive again. The lawsuit grew to more than 20 plaintiffs before the state’s Supreme Court ruled against her challenge last May .
But her story caught the attention of the White House, and she was invited to be First Lady Jill Biden’s guest to the 2023 State of the Union Address. The Biden campaign invited her to be a formal surrogate in January of this year.
Zurawski, now 37, has since traveled to over 30 cities in nine states on behalf of the Biden, and now Harris presidential campaign. She spoke on the first night of the DNC along with her husband, Josh, and Kaitlyn Joshua and Hadley Duvall, who have also become messengers for the campaign on reproductive care. Joshua was unable to secure medical care for her miscarriage due to Louisiana’s abortion restrictions, and Duvall described her pregnancy from sexual abuse by her stepfather.
“I can’t imagine not having a choice, but today that’s the reality for many women and girls across the country because of Donald Trump’s abortion bans,” Duvall, who has spoken out about the lack of rape and incest exceptions in Kentucky’s abortion law, said from the DNC main stage. “[Trump] calls it ‘a beautiful thing.’ What is so beautiful about a child having to carry her parent’s child?”
Zurawski has helped the campaign in less receptive settings as well. She joined a small contingency of Democrats blocks from the RNC in Milwaukee in July to counter Republican talking points. Stepping behind the lines of the other camp was a nerve wracking experience, she said, but “I was of course willing to do it, because I will do anything to make sure that we defeat Donald Trump.”
She also spoke to block walkers in Milwaukee to get more volunteers to counter the RNC programming in their backyard.
“I quit my job y’all so that I can do this until the elections,” Zurawski told the volunteers in Milwaukee. “I don’t want to have anything left in the tank. And I hope you feel the same way.”
Zurawski said she is hoping to stay politically engaged after the election, though she doesn’t know yet what that will look like. She said she would “love to be able to continue to support them in their administration,” but added she’s also passionate about local politics. She could see herself as a staffer or candidate. But more specific than that, she wouldn’t say.
“I haven’t even thought about it. That seems so far off,” Zurawski said. “I put all of my energy into getting Democrats elected this year.”
Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa said the state party hasn’t recruited Zurawski to run but would encourage her if she considered it.
Abortion’s centrality to this year’s election follows the 2022 overturning of Roe v. Wade, allowing states to implement abortion restrictions that impact over a third of reproductive-age women in the country.
Democrats have credited the loss of abortion rights for greater turnout among Democratic voters. The party was able to hold onto the U.S. Senate in 2022 despite a generally unfavorable map for Democrats and minimized losses in the U.S. House.
“The United States Supreme Court majority wrote the following, quote, ‘Women are not without electoral power’,” Biden said from the convention stage. “MAGA Republicans found out the power of women in 2022, and Donald Trump is going to find out the power of women in 2024.”
Zurawski was not the only Texan to talk about the issue at the convention. Kate Cox, who filed a historic lawsuit asking a judge to allow her to end her nonviable pregnancy, helped announce the state’s electoral votes during the convention. The Texas Supreme Court ultimately ruled against Cox and she had to travel out of state. But at the convention, she shared that she was expecting a child in January, “just in time to see Kamala Harris sworn in as president.”
Zurawski said she and the other women who spoke have found a support network with each other, texting often about a world of politics none of them had sought out.
“It started sort of small, then it just got bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger,” Zurawski said. “But we’re just so grateful to be able to use our story to hopefully affect change and make things better.”
-
When is the next election? What dates do I need to know?
-
What’s on the ballot for the general election?
-
How do I make sure I’m registered to vote?
-
How do I register to vote if I haven’t?
-
What can I do if I have questions about voting?
- Read more
Be there when Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin take the keynote stage at The Texas Tribune Festival! Whitmer will talk with Texas Tribune co-founder Evan Smith about her memoir, her key victories in Michigan and the importance of every vote. Youngkin and Smith will close out TribFest with a conversation about his record, the state of his party and a conservative policy agenda for America. Explore the full program of 300+ speakers and 100+ events.
