EMILYs List Statement on Adam Laxalt’s Candidacy for U.S. Senate

For Immediate Release

August 16, 2021

EMILYs List Statement on Adam Laxalt’s Candidacy for U.S. Senate 

Yesterday, Adam Laxalt filed his candidacy for U.S. Senate in Nevada with the FEC. Jessica Mackler, vice president of federal and gubernatorial campaigns at EMILYs List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, released the following statement:

“Adam Laxalt has spent his entire career working to undermine reproductive freedom and accessible, affordable health care. As attorney general, he disregarded the needs of his constituents in pursuit of dangerous restrictions on abortion. Nevadans have already rejected his extreme anti-choice agenda once, and they will do it again. With Roe v. Wade under unprecedented threat, Nevadans know that they need a pro-choice champion representing them in the Senate. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto has dedicated her career to protecting the right for people to make their own health care choices, and EMILYs List is proud to support her in this critical reelection fight.” 

Background:

As a Nevada co-chair for Donald Trump’s reelection campaign, Laxalt led a conspiracy-based lawsuit attempting to overturn Nevada’s presidential election results. His actions were a direct affront to free and fair elections in the state.

When running for governor in 2018, Laxalt said he would “look into” rolling back a Nevada law that guarantees access to abortion. 

As attorney general, Laxalt added Nevada to an amicus brief in favor of allowing fake health clinics to withhold crucial information from pregnant people about all their health care options. The brief also supported allowing unlicensed fake clinics to conceal the fact that they are unlicensed and do not employ medical professionals.

As part of his campaign for governor, Laxalt toured one of these fake health clinics.

• The fake health clinic has a long track record of creating obstacles for people seeking abortion care, including intentionally locating themselves next to a Las Vegas abortion provider.
• The fake clinic provides misleading statistics about miscarriages to convince people that they “may not need an abortion” and coerces pregnant people to get an immediate ultrasound.

Laxalt added Nevada to an amicus brief in favor of a Texas law that attempted to ban the most common method of second-trimester abortion. 

• A federal judge ruled the ban unconstitutional for being “unduly burdensome.”

Laxalt also signed a letter encouraging the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to allow health care professionals to deny essential care to patients based on religious or moral objections.

Laxalt signed an amicus brief supporting a Texas law that imposed medically unnecessary restrictions on abortion clinics in an attempt to limit availability of providers. The law was struck down by the Supreme Court for placing an unconstitutional burden on reproductive freedoms. 

During his gubernatorial run, Laxalt was endorsed by the anti-choice group Nevada Right to Life, an affiliate of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), which prioritizes state-level restrictions to abortion access.

EMILYs List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, has raised over $700 million to elect Democratic pro-choice women candidates. With a grassroots community of over five million members, EMILY's List helps Democratic women win competitive campaigns – across the country and up and down the ballot – by recruiting and training candidates, supporting and helping build strong campaigns, researching the issues that impact women and families, running nearly $50 million in independent expenditures in the last cycle alone, and turning out women voters and voters of color to the polls. Since our founding in 1985, we have helped elect the country's first woman as vice president, 158 women to the House, 26 to the Senate, 16 governors, and more than 1,300 women to state and local office. More than 40 percent of the candidates EMILYs List has helped elect to Congress have been women of color. After the 2016 election, more than 60,000 women reached out to EMILY's List about running for office laying the groundwork for the next decade of candidates for local, state, and national offices. In our effort to elect more women in offices across the country, we have created our Run to Win program, expanded our training program, including a Training Center online, and trained thousands of women.