Republican abortion – North Dakota Rep. Eric Murphy’s push to expand abortion access up to 15 weeks—and his loss after fierce opposition—echoes across GOP primaries in states including Tennessee, Louisiana and South Carolina, where anti-abortion groups, party endorsements and chall
When Eric Murphy walked into the hearing room last year, he brought something most lawmakers don’t: two stories read out loud.
Murphy. a Republican state representative in North Dakota. was trying to expand the window of pregnancy in which women could access abortion. North Dakota’s legislature had already banned abortion for almost everyone from the moment of conception. The ban was tied up in court and hadn’t yet gone into effect. but Murphy wanted to lock in a less restrictive law—allowing abortion up to 15 weeks and. later. for women whose doctors deemed it a medical necessity.
To make his case, Murphy read aloud from two ProPublica stories about women in Texas who died without lifesaving care. “Physicians felt compelled to follow the law,” he told lawmakers at the time, “and both women died so that an inane law could be followed.”
A conservative colleague, Murphy recalled to ProPublica, warned him not to file the bill. “I can no longer protect you from who’s going to come after you.”
Murphy’s primary election is set for June 9, and he believes he already knows why he could lose.
At least four Republican state lawmakers who challenged severe abortion restrictions—often by pushing for narrow exceptions—lost support from anti-abortion groups and key party allies and went on to lose primary elections. ProPublica found. Across those contests. the playbook looked strikingly similar: opponents embraced stricter abortion policies or avoided the issue altogether. anti-abortion organizations campaigned directly against the incumbents. party endorsements flipped to the challengers. and activists focused on turning out voters in low-participation primaries.
In some of the races reviewed, the lawmakers who replaced the reformers went on to back even stricter abortion legislation. In South Carolina. for example. two new senators supported a bill to eliminate almost all exceptions to the state’s abortion ban. One provision of the bill would send women convicted of illegally terminating their pregnancies to jail.
For Murphy, the outcome in North Dakota was decisive. His bill failed 87-6, and the North Dakota Supreme Court later reinstated the original ban forbidding abortion from conception, with exceptions for rape and incest up to six weeks and to save the life of the mother.
Murphy still faces a contested primary after that effort. He teaches biomedical sciences at the University of North Dakota’s medical school, and this year he is not running with the backing he once had: the first time he ran, his county’s Republican Party endorsed him. Not this time.
Instead, the party endorsed his two challengers, including Jill Chandler, the executive director of a “crisis pregnancy center” who believes abortion should be banned from conception.
Chandler told ProPublica she said she was “eye-opening” to realize Murphy was an endorsed Republican candidate. “To know that he was an endorsed Republican candidate from my district and one that I had voted for because of that endorsement was eye-opening. ” she said. “I remember thinking, ‘This can never happen again.’”.
Murphy. who had voted against book bans and private school vouchers. argued that the silent majority supports the intent of his abortion bill. But he pointed out how primaries can distort representation: turnout is typically low. and the results can come down to a handful of votes. “I might lose an election over this. ” Murphy said. “but would I rather win an election by not doing the right thing?”.
His case is part of a broader pattern where Republican legislators who sought exceptions found themselves treated as expendable.
In Tennessee, state Sen. Richard Briggs is facing a contested Aug. 6 primary after trying to keep his seat. In 2019. Briggs voted for the state’s so-called trigger law—a ban designed to snap into place if the federal right to abortion was overturned. But after that happened, Briggs changed his view. He realized the newly activated law didn’t provide adequate protections for patients with medical complications.
Briggs—who is a cardiothoracic surgeon—said. “As a medical doctor. I drew the line.” He introduced bills for a clearer medical exception and protection for doctors who intervened when a fatal fetal anomaly posed a risk to the mother’s health. The latter bill failed and became a weapon for his opponent.
In the campaign, his challenger Kent Morrell points to Briggs’ record. “My opponent consistently works to weaken Tennessee’s pro life laws,” Morrell says on his campaign website, noting that Tennessee Right to Life had revoked its endorsement of Briggs.
Louisiana offers another echo.
Mary DuBuisson. a former Republican state representative in a suburb outside of New Orleans. considered herself passionately “pro-life.” Like Briggs. she voted for her state’s near-total abortion ban in 2019. Three years later. just before Louisiana’s trigger law was implemented. she sought changes meant to protect women in specific circumstances. She wanted victims of rape and incest to be able to terminate their pregnancies. When her colleagues refused to include those exceptions, she became the only Republican to vote against the ban.
A year later, DuBuisson sponsored a bill that would have allowed women whose pregnancies were not viable to end them. She said at the time. “To force a woman to carry to term with zero chance of survival is heartless and cruel.” She told ProPublica she didn’t expect pushback. Other Republican women in the House told her she was doing the right thing.
But the bill died in committee. Another female Republican state lawmaker made the motion that succeeded in killing it. “I mean, I just couldn’t understand,” she said. “What if this was you, your daughter or granddaughter?”
Her 2023 primary became a referendum on her votes. Her opponent. Brian Glorioso. an attorney she had handily defeated in 2018. attacked her proposed legislation as a “leftist attempt to circumvent the state’s abortion ban.” He also claimed any “pro-abortion” doctor would falsely deem a pregnancy nonviable in records to perform the procedure.
DuBuisson beat Glorioso in the Oct. 14, 2023, primary by 384 votes, but it still wasn’t enough to avoid a runoff. On Oct. 16. Louisiana Right to Life told followers that the runoff was key. and it framed the contrast in voting records: Glorioso was expected to have a 100% “pro-life” voting record while DuBuisson’s was 77%.
Then the political endorsement came. On Oct. 27, the state’s new governor-elect, Republican Jeff Landry, endorsed Glorioso, saying it was based on issues other than abortion. Landry wouldn’t tell ProPublica whether DuBuisson’s record on abortion played a role. but the campaign context was unmistakable: Landry had defended the state’s ban as attorney general and. during his campaign. described himself as an “an unwavering defender of life. especially in the face of adversity. ” citing his 100% rating from a national anti-abortion group.
DuBuisson later said she believed it cost her. “I think it partially cost me my election,” she said.
In South Carolina, the consequences were even more immediate.
Three state senators—Sandy Senn. Penry Gustafson. and Katrina Shealy—each described themselves as “pro-life” while working across party lines against an abortion bill that essentially banned the procedure from conception and eliminated rape and incest exceptions. At the time, South Carolina law allowed abortion up to 20 weeks.
Senn and Gustafson spoke out against limiting abortion access for victims of rape and incest. Shealy pushed for making abortion accessible up to 12 weeks and later for exceptions involving rape, incest and fatal fetal anomalies. Ultimately, a six-week window with rape, incest and fatal fetal exceptions became law.
But the political backlash rolled forward into elections. The senators were nicknamed the “Sister Senators,” and all lost their county GOP’s endorsement to male opponents.
Anti-abortion groups escalated their campaign against them. Students for Life Action said it generated “37,000 pieces of mail, almost 130,000 personal text messages, more than 51,000 phone calls and thousands of doors knocked” to unseat the trio.
Dr. Matthew Clark. executive director of Personhood South Carolina—which believes abortion shouldn’t exist at all and that women who have them should be prosecuted for murder—said of the results. “All three of them got voted out — every single one of them lost because of that decision.” Clark added that he believes the group’s desired legislation has a better chance to advance now that the Sister Senators have been replaced.
The replacement lawmakers quickly moved the agenda in harsher directions. Matt Leber. who beat Senn. had previously co-sponsored a bill in the state House that would make abortion a crime equivalent to homicide. but it failed to advance and he withdrew his name as a co-sponsor amid controversy in 2023. This legislative session. Leber and Carlisle Kennedy. who beat Shealy. supported a bill carrying misdemeanor criminal penalties for women seeking abortions. with jail time up to two years. Senate Bill 1095 passed with supermajority support out of a committee Leber sits on, but it died before the session ended.
The scale of turnout helps explain how political punishment can become swift.
Polls in states including South Carolina and Louisiana have found many Republican voters support at least some exceptions to abortion bans. including rape or threats to a woman’s health. But primary elections often draw only a small fraction of eligible voters. That means organized activists and interest groups can weigh more heavily than the broader electorate.
DuBuisson’s runoff drew about one-third of registered voters. In South Carolina, primary participation was lower still, and some races were decided by extremely narrow margins; Senn lost hers by 33 votes.
Even as polling suggested some restrictions were losing support, the North Dakota GOP moved further to the right on abortion. At its 2026 convention, the party passed a resolution rejecting any policies that “normalize” abortion.
North Dakota is also one of the few states with a multimember system. where two representatives and one senator govern together in the same district. District 43—which Murphy represents—is one of the only purple districts in an otherwise deeply red state. It includes part of Grand Forks, a growing college town home to the University of North Dakota.
Murphy’s situation also intersected with shifting electoral math inside his own party. His fellow representative. Democrat Zac Ista. told ProPublica he hadn’t been able to make a dent in the legislature and announced he wouldn’t be seeking reelection. opening up an opportunity for a Republican takeover of the district.
Ista said the lack of support for Murphy was tied to his position on abortion and also to culture-war legislation Murphy refused to support. “I think it’s illustrative of that schism. where at this district level. Republicans are really trying to sort of press the most extreme conservative opinions. ” Ista said.
Richard Glynn, the GOP county chair in Murphy’s district, had previously supported Murphy’s abortion bill. In written testimony. Glynn described his experience hearing about young women performing illegal abortions when he was a freshman at the University of South Dakota in 1966. He wrote that four young women in sororities died from using metal hangers to terminate their pregnancies. and that these deaths were viewed as preventable if they had received competent care. His letter also said North Dakota was going down a similar path with limited access to obstetric care that negatively impacts the health of the woman.
When reached by phone, Glynn said county delegates voted and Murphy had the least amount of votes, which is why he did not receive the county’s endorsement. He declined to answer more questions before hanging up.
One of Murphy’s opponents, Mike Holmes, has drawn attention and received an endorsement from Gov. Kelly Armstrong for his expertise in energy technology and industrial development. Armstrong said Holmes understands “what it takes to keep North Dakota’s economy strong.” Holmes has remained silent on abortion and did not respond to ProPublica’s requests for an interview.
Chandler, meanwhile, is favored among anti-abortion groups. “It’s a pretty stark contrast,” said Bridget Turbide, executive director of North Dakota Right to Life, who called Murphy’s proposal “the most extreme pro-choice bill we’ve ever seen.”
A flyer promoting Jill Chandler was paid for by Citizens Alliance of North Dakota, a conservative group that opposes abortion among other causes. The same group marked Murphy in “bad standing” in an online roster of legislators, questioning his alignment with North Dakota values.
Murphy’s third colleague representing District 43, Republican State Sen. Jeff Barta, campaigned alongside Murphy in 2022 as part of a unified Republican ticket when the primary election was uncontested.
Asked about the upcoming race and the candidates, Barta pointed to Murphy’s proposal that would have expanded abortion access in North Dakota. “Last session, he introduced House Bill 1488, which created a little divide there,” Barta said.
Barta said Murphy has broken with the party on other issues, too. “That probably opened the door for the third candidate to run,” he added. Barta suggested that if that hadn’t happened, Murphy would have reached the general election without having to defend his spot on the ballot.
Before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. lawmakers taking nuanced stands on abortion bans may not have been treated as career-ending risks. said abortion historian and law professor Mary Ziegler. “The kind of incrementalism that Eric Murphy seems to be doing is something from a bygone era. where people were more pragmatic in the movement and not punished for it. ” she said.
United States politics abortion North Dakota Tennessee Louisiana South Carolina Eric Murphy Richard Briggs Mary DuBuisson primary elections anti-abortion groups Jill Chandler Kent Morrell Students for Life Action