Politics

(WASHINGTON) — California Congresswoman Judy Chu is the lead sponsor of the Women’s Health Protection Act. Along with the Freedom to Travel for Health Care Act, these two pieces of legislation aim to cement protections to reproductive rights by ensuring a federal right to abortion and ability to travel across state lines to get an abortion although neither are expected to pass the Senate.

Chu spoke with “GMA3” about these bills, what needs to be done to protect women’s reproductive rights and the healthcare provisions in the newly passed Inflation Reduction Act.

GMA3: California Congresswoman Judy Chu, welcome back to the program. We hear they are not expected [to pass]. Your Women’s Health Protection Act has passed the House for a second time, did it in July. Realistically, it is not going anywhere in the Senate. So I guess what do you do with it now? What is the next step?

CHU: Well, it actually had a very close vote in the Senate, 49 to 51. But the Senate has that 60 vote filibuster requirement. And so what we need are two votes in the Senate. We need two votes that will eliminate the filibuster and also vote for the Women’s Health Protection Act.

There are two candidates that have said that they would do that, John Fetterman, who is a senatorial candidate in Pennsylvania, and Mandela Barnes, who actually won his primary last night in Wisconsin. It’s just two more votes that we need. And then we can make Roe versus Wade the law of the land, as it has been for 50 years.

GMA3: Congresswoman Chu, in a recent op-ed you wrote, “We are living in a post-Roe reality and every opportunity must be explored. We cannot leave one stone unturned.” Obviously, you just talked about the need you believe to abolish the filibuster. What else realistically can be done?

CHU: There is so much that we need to do. There are states that are putting ballot initiatives on this November ballot. And in fact, our state of California is making abortion a constitutional right on the ballot. But we also need to protect women’s rights to cross state lines and also ensure that women in emergency rooms can get the abortion care that they need regardless of what state they’re in, because that is a federal law.

We need to make sure that there is access to contraception and there is a program called Title Ten, actually, that has guaranteed that right and has fully funded it. We actually need to make sure that it is funded even further because we know that women will need to depend on contraception in order to ensure that they are healthy and that they can have the freedom to face their futures.

So there is much to be done, as well as helping women who may not be able to afford an abortion in their own state. There need to be ways to ensure that they have that ability in other states, and so funds are needed to ensure that they can cross the state lines and can have the hotel and travel expenses covered.

GMA3: Congresswoman, the vote in Kansas, overwhelmingly, voters there wanted to uphold abortion rights. What’s the significance, in your opinion, of what we saw in Kansas, beyond Kansas?

CHU: I was so encouraged by the vote in Kansas. The vote was overwhelming. It was an 18 point margin and this was in a state that is Republican and voted for [Former President Donald]Trump. But what the voters saw was that there was a need to ensure that we do not go backwards in this country, that young women have less rights than their grandmothers. Instead, they upheld the right to an abortion. They upheld Roe versus Wade. And in fact, actually, 70% of Americans believe that Roe versus Wade should be upheld. So I believe that they reflect the sentiment in this country.

GMA3: Congresswoman Chu, the Inflation Reduction Act, as you know, passed the Senate. It awaits a vote in the House. And among the things it purports to do, it will lower healthcare costs for families. It tackles climate change. But a lot of opponents say it really isn’t going to do anything when it comes to the inflation. We’ve just got the new numbers actually out, 8.5% for July. Will the Inflation Reduction Act actually reduce inflation?

CHU: I believe it will, in fact, immediately. It will lower costs for Americans. For one thing, there will be rebates and grants for Americans to be able to afford energy efficient appliances and solar panels, and therefore, they will be able to lower their utility costs. And immediately, there will be a $2,000 cap for seniors who are on Medicare for their prescription drugs so that they do not have to pay more out-of-pocket every year. And of course, there will be a limit on the amount that insulin will cost for those on Medicare, a limit of $35 a month. It is things like that that will enable Americans to afford to pay their own expenses. And because of that, it will lower inflation for sure.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Former President Donald Trump’s false allegation that the 2020 presidential election was stolen continues to reverberate among GOP political candidates who are running on anti-establishment platforms and eager to gain the support of the former president’s voter base.

Kari Lake is one of those candidates. The former newscaster-turned-gubernatorial candidate in Arizona won a spot on the ballot August 4 and will face Democratic nominee Katie Hobbs in November.

In her victory speech, Lake said, “we outvoted the fraud, we didn’t listen to what the fake news had to say. The MAGA movement rose up and voted like their lives depended on it.”

When asked directly to corroborate her unsubstantiated allegation that the election system is fraudulent, she vaguely claimed, “we have a lot of evidence of irregularities and problems.”

“I’m not going to release it to the fake news,” she added, “but we’ll release it to the authorities.”

Kari Lake, Republican candidate for governor of Arizona holds a press conference at her campaign headquarters in Phoenix, Ariz., Aug. 3, 2022.

According to an analysis by ABC News partner FiveThirtyEight, at least 120 Republican political candidates who deny the integrity of the 2020 elections will be on ballots this fall.

An additional 48 nominees have expressed doubt about the election’s integrity, meaning half of Republican candidates have “at least flirted with” denying the election, according to the FiveThirtyEight analysis.

“Concerns inside the Republican Party about voter integrity also is something that’s been going on for decades” Rick Klein, Political Director at ABC News, told “NIGHTLINE.”

“What’s different is that you had in former President Trump someone who, during the campaign, actively stowed mistrust in the system,” he added.

These claims remaining popular despite the fact that multiple lawsuits and investigations nationwide after the 2020 presidential election never came close to proving election fraud that would call into question President Biden’s victory over Donald Trump.

Last week, a candidate endorsed by former President Trump, businesswoman Tudor Dixon, won her party’s gubernatorial nomination in Michigan.

When asked directly about the legitimacy of the 2020 election, Dixon told a Fox News reporter, “it’s certainly a concern for a lot of folks here in Michigan because of the way the election was handled by our secretary of state.”

Political newcomer John Gibbs, also a Michigan Republican endorsed by Trump, beat the incumbent Republican Rep. Peter Meijer last week.

Earlier this summer Gibbs falsely claimed that the 2020 election results weren’t accurate, telling a local NBC station, “I think when you look at the results of the 2020 election, there are anomalies in there, to put it very lightly, that are simply mathematically impossible.”

In the coming weeks, dozens of other candidates will be decided, revealing how deeply Republican voters are invested in the former president’s claims of a stolen election.

“In a Republican primary it is a definite boon to a candidate to say that you deny the legitimacy of the last election,” Klein said.

“It gets you on the radar screen of former President Trump, who’s had a terrific track record through many of the primaries in redder states,” said Klein.

“The other thing it does is a connection to a segment of the base for whom denying the last election’s outcome is almost a mantra,” he said.

The baseless idea planted by Donald Trump that there’s rampant voter fraud and cheating at the ballot box, two allegations that have repeatedly been proven false, taking hold in the minds of many voters.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(OMAHA, Neb.) — Answering questions at the FBI Omaha, Nebraska field office, FBI Director Christopher Wray said Wednesday he couldn’t talk about FBI agents searching Mar-a-Lago, the home of former President Donald Trump, but did say that he is “always concerned” about the threats to law enforcement.

“Well, as I’m sure you can appreciate that’s not something I can talk about,” Wray said, becoming the first senior Justice Department official to decline to comment on the record and on camera about the search of the former president’s estate.

Multiple sources confirmed to ABC News that former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was raided by FBI agents on Monday.

The sources told ABC News that the search began at around 10 a.m.

The former president put out a statement Monday evening saying federal investigators were there and that they had even gotten into his safe.

It is standard Justice Department practice to not comment on ongoing investigations.

There is an uptick in violent threats against rank and file FBI agents in the wake of the raid, senior law enforcement officials told ABC News.

While not directly addressing those threats, Wray said any threat against law enforcement is cause for concern.

“Violence against law enforcement is not the answer, no matter what anyone is upset about,” Wray said. “In the last few years we’ve had an alarming rise in violence against law enforcement.”

The Director said it takes a “special person” to sacrifice his or her life for a stranger, and that is what law enforcement officers, including FBI agents, do every day.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(OMAHA, Neb.) — Answering questions at the FBI Omaha, Nebraska field office, FBI Director Christopher Wray said Wednesday he couldn’t talk about FBI agents searching Mar-a-Lago, the home of former President Donald Trump, but did say that he is “always concerned” about the threats to law enforcement.

“Well, as I’m sure you can appreciate that’s not something I can talk about,” Wray said, becoming the first senior Justice Department official to decline to comment on the record and on camera about the search of the former president’s estate.

Multiple sources confirmed to ABC News that former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was raided by FBI agents on Monday.

The sources told ABC News that the search began at around 10 a.m.

The former president put out a statement Monday evening saying federal investigators were there and that they had even gotten into his safe.

It is standard Justice Department practice to not comment on ongoing investigations.

There is an uptick in violent threats against rank and file FBI agents in the wake of the raid, senior law enforcement officials told ABC News.

While not directly addressing those threats, Wray said any threat against law enforcement is cause for concern.

“Violence against law enforcement is not the answer, no matter what anyone is upset about,” Wray said. “In the last few years we’ve had an alarming rise in violence against law enforcement.”

The director said it takes a “special person” to sacrifice his or her life for a stranger, and that is what law enforcement officers, including FBI agents, do every day.

When asked for more specifics on the threats against FBI agents, the FBI offered a generic statement and provided no details.

“The FBI is always concerned about violence and threats of violence to law enforcement, including the men and women of the FBI,” an unnamed FBI spokesperson said in an e-mail to ABC News. “We work closely with our law enforcement partners to assess and respond to such threats, which are reprehensible and dangerous. As always, we would like to remind members of the public that if they observe anything suspicious to report it to law enforcement immediately.”

As a reminder, Wray was appointed by former President Trump in 2017, and has not been outspoken on many controversial issues.

The President of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association (FLEOA) called the recent threats against FBI agents in the wake of the raid on Mar-a-Lago “politically motivated threats of violence” and “unprecedented,” in a statement Wednesday.

“Levying threats against apolitical federal employees simply applying the law to the facts of a case it not a democratic way to solve anything. It is also illegal,” Larry Cosme said. “An investigation will not occur unless there are allegations of violations of the law and will not progress unless there is evidence of wrongdoing.”

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump indicated that he pleaded the Fifth Amendment on Wednesday as he was deposed in a New York state civil investigation into his business dealings — which marks a reversal for a real estate baron who had cast aspersions on others who protected themselves from the possibility of self-incrimination.

Trump sat for a deposition in New York Attorney General Letitia James’ probe into whether he misstated the value of his assets to his own benefit, an investigation he has labeled a partisan “witch hunt.” (James is a Democrat.)

Trump’s appearance in New York marked the third straight day that he has faced legal challenges. His Mar-a-Lago residence was searched by the FBI in Florida on Monday in relation, sources told ABC News, to documents that he took with him when he departed Washington, including some records the National Archives has said were marked classified.

Separately, a federal appeals court on Tuesday ruled that his tax returns could be obtained by a House panel that has sought them for years.

In a rare move, Trump acknowledged in a statement Wednesday that he had changed his mind about invoking the Fifth.

But he argued that he was forced to after facing what he continued to describe as partisan probes, particularly the Mar-a-Lago search.

“I once asked, ‘If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?’ Now I know the answer to that question. When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become the targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice,” he said in his statement.

“If there was any question in my mind, the raid of my home, Mar-a-Lago, on Monday by the FBI, just two days prior to this deposition, wiped out any uncertainty,” he added, going on to say that in the New York deposition, “under the advice of my counsel and for all of the above reasons, I declined to answer the questions under the rights and privileges afforded to every citizen under the United States Constitution.”

As Trump suggested in his statement, he previously painted those who cited the Fifth as guilty of some crime.

When Trump ran for president in 2016, he questioned why aides to Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton were taking the Fifth in connection with an investigation into the deadly raid on a U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

“So, there are five people taking the Fifth Amendment. Like you see on the mob, right? You see the mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” he asked at the time.

Decades ago, during his divorce from Ivana Trump, he also invoked the Fifth, according to one biography.

The amendment, among other provisions, protects people from being made to testify against themselves.

In civil cases, but not in criminal cases, a person who invokes the Fifth may have negative conclusions drawn about that choice — just as Trump had previously said.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.) — Supporters and critics of Donald Trump continued to gather outside Mar-a-Lago two days after it was searched by the FBI.

Trucks toting Trump flags were seen on the road outside of his residence and private club in Palm Beach, Florida, though the former president was in New York on Wednesday for a previously planned deposition in state Attorney General Letitia James’ investigation into allegations he inflated the value of his business and properties. (He has said he did nothing wrong and indicated he pleaded the Fifth in the deposition.)

It isn’t clear how many people have been congregating outside Mar-a-Lago on Monday and Tuesday. But a report from ABC affiliate WPBF showed that at one point it was less than a few dozen, along with press and law enforcement.

WPBF reported that the groups grew larger as it got later both Monday and Tuesday.

Residents there gave differing views on the FBI search and not all of them were pro-Trump.

“It’s wrong. It’s wrong. It’s wrong,” Stephen Moise, of Jupiter, told WPBF on Monday. “They shouldn’t be doing this to him.”

“I think it’s high time that we’ve seen the government finally take some action against this man,” said Michael Kennedy, of West Palm Beach.

According to WPBF, those gathered at Mar-a-Lago broke down multiple times into “profanity-laced arguments,” but there was no violence.

The Monday morning search by the FBI set off a political firestorm in conservative circles, with Republicans accusing the investigation — without offering evidence — of being politically motivated.

Trump said the raid was “not necessary or appropriate” and amounted to persecution by “Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for President in 2024.

Sources told ABC News that agents were at Mar-a-Lago as part of an investigation into the removal of classified documents from the White House when Trump left the presidency and decamped to his Florida resort.

While it’s not yet known precisely what the FBI was searching for or what was seized, Republicans in Congress have panned the unprecedented search as an egregious overreach and vowed to open investigations into it should they retake the House in November.

ABC News confirmed that, separately, law enforcement agencies across the country have been actively monitoring angry and violent rhetoric online sparked by the raid, with agencies preparing for possible acts of violence they fear could occur at or near pro-Trump protest demonstrations.

ABC News’ Josh Margolin contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden on Wednesday enacted legislation that will expand the Department of Veterans Affairs, providing health care support to millions of veterans — as well as their families and caretakers — who were exposed to toxic burn pits.

Known as the PACT Act, the package grants more time to enroll in VA-provided care for veterans exposed to the toxins while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to the White House.

“This is the most significant law our nation has ever passed to help millions of veterans who are exposed to toxic substances during their military services,” Biden said in remarks during the bill signing ceremony in the White House’s East Room.

The legislation simplifies how the VA determines if someone’s service put them at risk, which the White House and veterans say is often difficult to prove on an individual basis.

Some veterans or their survivors diagnosed with one of 23 specific conditions will no longer need to prove a direct service connection, per the new law, which also invests in toxic exposure research, among other things.

Burn pits in Afghanistan and Iraq could be “the size of football fields,” Biden said at the signing. The U.S. military used them to incinerate waste from operations there, which included “tires, poisonous chemicals, jet fuel and so much more,” he said.

The issue is personal for the president, who for years has wondered if late-son Beau’s brain cancer stemmed from exposure to burn pits during his deployment in Iraq.

“When they came home, many of the fittest and best warriors that we sent to war were not the same. Headaches, numbness, dizziness, cancer. My son Beau was one of them,” Biden said.

But the PACT Act, which the president called on Congress to take up last year, almost didn’t make it to his desk for a signature.

The proposal had faced uncertainty in the Senate after some Republican lawmakers changed their minds, voting against ending debate on the bill after they voted in favor of it weeks earlier — a convoluted timeline because a change to the text in the House required a re-vote.

It ultimately passed the Senate a second time, last Tuesday, with 11 Republican holdouts after protesters, many of them veterans, spent days advocating for their cause in front of the Senate steps. (GOP lawmakers had cited concerns about what they said were Democratic spending maneuvers bundled in the bill.)

Among the demonstrators urging PACT’s passage was actor and comedian Jon Stewart, who himself protested for hours outside the Capitol and walked the halls of Congress to meet with senators last week. He attended the bill signing Wednesday morning.

“What you’ve done matters,” Biden told Stewart, who received a standing ovation. “It really, really matters … And we owe you big.”

Some veterans and survivors who lobbied on the Hill last week also joined Biden and lawmakers at the signing.

Biden spoke with several of them before he left the East Room, handing out challenge coins to some, embracing others and thanking them for their service.

“This law is long overdue, but we finally got it done together,” he said.

ABC News’ Mary Bruce and Justin Gomez contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department on Wednesday unsealed charges against an Iranian national and member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps whom prosecutors say allegedly tried to arrange the murder of Donald Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton in “likely” retaliation for the killing of top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani when Trump was president.

The criminal complaint against 45-year-old Shahram Poursafi, who remains at large abroad, accuses him of attempting to pay various individuals in the U.S. $300,000 to kill Bolton, beginning in October.

Poursafi is charged with use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire and with providing and attempting to provide material support to a transnational murder plot.

In a statement after the case was unsealed Wednesday, Bolton said, in part: “I wish to thank the Justice Department for initiating the criminal proceeding unsealed today; the FBI for its diligence in discovering and tracking the Iranian regime’s criminal threat to American citizens; and the Secret Service for once again providing protection against Tehran’s efforts.”

“While much cannot be said publicly right now, one point is indisputable: Iran’s rulers are liars, terrorists, and enemies of the United States. Their radical, anti-American objectives are unchanged; their commitments are worthless; and their global threat is growing,” Bolton said.

The complaint and supporting law enforcement affidavit further allege how the Tehran-based Poursafi and the person he wanted to hire in the U.S. to arrange the killing — identified by the FBI as a confidential human source — conducted months of video and photo surveillance of Bolton at his home and office, in the Washington area, in late 2021 and early 2022.

According to the affidavit’s timeline, on Oct. 22 Poursafi asked an unnamed U.S. resident to take photographs of Bolton while claiming it was for a book that Poursafi was writing. The resident later introduced Poursafi to the FBI’s confidential source and Poursafi offered this person money to hire someone to “eliminate” Bolton, adding he had another “job” for which he would pay $1,000,000, the affidavit claims.

Investigators also said that Poursafi appeared to have private information about Bolton’s routine and schedule, though the source of his information was not clear.

At one point Poursafi allegedly suggested Bolton be killed by car or in the parking garage at his work and later said he should be shot — either while he was alone or, if he was in a group, without harming anyone else — the FBI said in the complaint affidavit.

The source whom Poursafi allegedly worked with told Poursafi they were working with a third individual who had ties to a cartel, the affidavit states.

The complaint affidavit also documents extensive communications between Poursafi and the confidential source. At one point, according to the complaint, he advised the source that killing someone “was like crossing the street; it was better not to spend too much time looking in one direction, but just to do it.”

Poursafi also told the FBI’s source that his “group” would require video confirmation of the target’s death, according to the affidavit. Poursafi repeatedly made further contact with the source, stating he was under pressure from his “group” or “his people” to have the killing carried out.

In January, the FBI alleged in the affidavit, Poursafi told the source he had a second “job” once Bolton was killed and he suggested that someone working for the Revolutionary Guard Corps was conducting surveillance on an unnamed second target in the U.S.

“This is not the first time we have uncovered Iranian plots to exact revenge against individuals on U.S. soil and we will work tirelessly to expose and disrupt every one of these efforts,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen said in a statement Wednesday.

ABC News’ Adam Carlson and John Santucci contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was searched by federal agents Monday morning in what an outside expert called a “major escalation” of one of the investigations he faces.

Sources told ABC News that the raid, carried out by the FBI, was related to the 15 boxes of records that the former president took to his Florida home when he left the White House.

Trump, who was not present for Monday’s search, said in a statement that the agents obtained access to his safe as they executed the search warrant. Sources told ABC News that the safe referenced was in Trump’s office on the compound; people close to Trump said that agents did not ask for the code and instead broke it open.

Law enforcement experts unconnected to the case called the raid a notable step forward in the federal probe — which appears to trace back to a National Archives referral to the Department of Justice reported early this year — and they explained the significance of federal search warrants and what they indicate about the general timeline of a case.

“[The search is] absolutely unprecedented and is a major escalation,” Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor and president of West Coast Trial Lawyers, told ABC News.

“We haven’t heard much from [Attorney General] Merrick Garland in the past year and a half, but this is a clear indication that the Department of Justice is going to move forward,” Rahmani added.

The DOJ opened the grand jury investigation after National Archives officials confirmed in a letter to the House Oversight Committee that some of the documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago were marked classified. The National Archives referred the matter to the attorney general.

While little has been reported publicly about the probe, in keeping with department policy, experts said that in order to obtain a search warrant, investigators needed to have probable cause of a violation of federal law.

That means authorities would need to prove that there is sufficient reason based on known facts to believe that a crime has been committed, or that a certain property is connected with a crime.

The raid, however, doesn’t mean prosecutors have determined Trump committed a crime. In his statement, he labeled Monday’s raid an act of political persecution.

While probable cause is a lower legal standard than beyond a reasonable doubt or preponderance of evidence, experts said it’s likely the federal case is airtight given the gravity of raiding the residence of a former president.

“This thing would have to be bulletproof,” Nick Akerman, a former Watergate special prosecutor, told ABC News.

“This would be a very detailed affidavit that would almost present a case beyond reasonable doubt, such that there’s no way you could ever fault a judge or a prosecutor issuing this warrant,” he said.

The issuance of a federal warrant also likely means investigators received new information justifying such a seizure.

“The probable cause cannot be stale,” Akerman said. “This can’t be based on something that happened 18 months ago when Trump left office, it has to be something that happened more recently.”

In response to the warrant, many leading Republicans have echoed Trump in accusing the DOJ of being politically motivated. Some invoked the looming November midterm elections.

“The Department of Justice has reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said in a statement. “When Republicans take back the House, we will conduct immediate oversight of this department, follow the facts, and leave no stone unturned.”

Trump said the search was an “an attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for President in 2024.”

Generally speaking, the DOJ avoids major actions involving political candidates in the months just before an election. But that rule is not written into law — as was seen when the FBI publicly commented on its investigation into how Hillary Clinton handled classified material in the final days of the 2016 presidential race — and Trump has not declared he is running again in 2024.

The indication that the FBI search was in relation to Trump’s handling of government files has raised questions about one statute in particular: Section 2071 of Title 18 of the United States Code.

The law states that anyone who “willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies or destroys” government records faces a fine or up to three years in prison and is “disqualified from holding any office under the United States.”

But legal scholars have long been torn about whether the statute, which was also in the spotlight when Clinton used a private email server to conduct government business while secretary of state, could actually bar Trump from seeking another term given that the Constitution sets out the sole qualifications to be president.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — With Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy retiring after 48 years in office and the state’s only representative, Peter Welch, hoping to fill his Senate seat after 16 years in the House, Vermonters are virtually certain to send a woman to Congress for the first time in the state’s history — with ABC News projecting that state Sen. Becca Balint will win her primary race on Tuesday.

Vermont, despite its progressive reputation among many given how Sen. Bernie Sanders towers over the local political landscape, is the last state in the nation to send a woman to Washington, partly because it’s had fewer opportunities with men like Leahy, Sanders and Welch serving for long stretches in the mere three congressional seats.

Balint, a former teacher-turned-legislator who has served in the Vermont Senate since 2014, gained popularity among progressive voters with endorsements from Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. (The co-founders of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream also backed her.) Since last year, she has served as president pro tempore of her state’s upper chamber — the first woman and first openly gay person in the position — and she was the Democratic majority leader for the four years prior.

She would also be the first openly gay lawmaker to represent Vermont on Capitol Hill.

“In my family, we know what’s at stake,” she said in a campaign video posted to Twitter last week, focusing on abortion and voting rights. “My grandfather was murdered in the Holocaust. My whole life I’ve known that beating the forces set on dividing us takes showing up every chance you get.”

She announced on Dec. 13 that she would seek the Democratic nomination to succeed Welch and saw early enthusiasm, raising more than $125,000 within 24 hours of her announcement. Sanders endorsed Balint in July and held at least three rallies across the state to stump for Balint, who was leading in polls heading into the primary.

LGBTQ and progressive political action committees have spent more than $800,000 backing Balint, according to a report in VT Digger, which her leading opponent took aim at — arguing Vermonters should be deciding the race, not political groups.

She is projected to have won more votes than Lt. Gov. Molly Gray, another candidate seeking Welch’s seat, who touted her congressional ties to Welch and Leahy in her campaign.

Balint will go on to the November general election against a Republican challenger, though Vermont’s House seat has not been filled by a Republican in 30 years.

Both Balint and Gray said they support a national single-payer health care system, allowing Medicare to negotiate prices, as well as re-instating a nationwide assault weapons ban and funding federal paid family and medical leave, according to their websites.

But one way they differed was on how to handle the opioid crisis, which they both cited as an issue.

Balint said she supports so-called “safe injection sites” for drug users to prevent overdosing, while Gray had said she was “willing to consider” them.

Gray has a background in law and worked in Congress for five years, first for Welch and then for the International Committee of the Red Cross. Before being elected lieutenant governor last midterm cycle, she served as an assistant attorney general.

Balint also defeated physician Louis Meyers and former social worker Sianay Chase Clifford.

The leading candidates in the Republican primary for the at-large congressional district were Liam Madden, a Marine Corps veteran, and Ericka Redic, an accountant and podcast host, both native to the state.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.