"I want to be an America where everybody has a chance," Warren said of abortion access.
In addition to calling for legislative codefication of Roe, Warren also called for federal laws to overturn state regulations of abortion such as "geographical, physical, and procedural restrictions and requirements" and "restrictions on medication abortion."
She has also supported taxpayer funding of elective abortions, coverage of abortion and contraceptives in health plans and in Medicare-for-All, services to educate and inform women about abortion access, and protections against workplace discrimination of abortion.
During the debate, the president of the organization Democrats for Life of America, Kristen Day, tweeted that in "talking to dems on the ground" in Atlanta, she was "surprised about how many people do not know that their candidate supports late-term abortion."
The pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List tweeted that "79% of Americans OPPOSE late-term abortion" and that the "candidates' abortion extremism is a major political vulnerability in November 2020."
While late-term abortions were not a specific topic of discussion at Wednesday's debate, candidates did not elaborate on any proposed limits to abortion access.
Sen. Corey Booker (D-N.J.) said that the matter of state abortion laws "is a voting issue" and "a voter suppression issue," claiming that Georgia's Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams lost her 2018 race against current governor Brian Kemp because of "voter suppression, particularly of African-American communities."
"The 'heartbeat' bill here, opposed by over 70% of Georgians, is the result of voter suppression," Booker said of Georgia's "heartbeat" law that outlawed abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected. Gov. Kemp signed the bill into law in May, but the law was temporarily prevented from going into effect by a federal judge.
Booker implied that Gov. Kemp used the law as a weapon against the African-American community in Georgia. "When you have undemocratic means, when you suppress peoples' votes to get elected, those are the very people you're going to come after when you're in office," Booker said of the "heartbeat" bill.
Day tweeted in response that "If Stacey Abrams had taken a moderate position on abortion, she would have won," referring to the 2018 Georgia gubernatorial election.
"The only Democratic Governor in the south is a pro-life Democrat. Abortion extremism & an abortion litmus test suppresses votes," Day tweeted, referring to John Bel Edwards in Louisiana.
(Story continues below)
Subscribe to our daily newsletter
Edwards won his race with a high turnout of the African-American vote.
In an interview with local NPR affiliate WRKF, Edwards' campaign consultant Greg Rigamer said that the African-American turnout in the election was higher in number than in the previous gubernatorial race, although representing a smaller share of the overall vote. Edwards, he said, "got literally-- unequivocally-- over 98% of the African American votes."