Kentucky

Campaign advocate for abortion rights makes plea for Kentucky lawmakers to relax abortion ban

Published

2 years ago

January 9, 2024

Campaign advocate for abortion rights makes plea for Kentucky lawmakers to relax abortion ban

FRANKFORT, Ky. — A young woman who dominated the discussion about abortion during Kentucky’s campaign last year stepped forward again Tuesday to call on lawmakers to relax the state’s near-total abortion ban.

Months after revealing the trauma of being raped and impregnated in a powerful campaign ad, Hadley Duvall went to the statehouse to endorse a bill that would add exceptions to the anti-abortion law. The measure would allow abortions when pregnancies are caused by rape or incest, or when pregnancies are deemed nonviable or medical emergencies threaten the mother.

She teamed with Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear and the bill’s lead sponsor to try to generate momentum, but its fate ultimately will be decided by Republican supermajorities in the legislature. The prospects for carving out more exceptions appear to be uncertain as GOP lawmakers wrangle with the issue.

Duvall, now a college senior in her early 20s, became pregnant as a seventh grader but ultimately miscarried. Her stepfather was convicted of rape. She recounted those traumatic events in a Beshear campaign ad attacking his Republican challenger’s longstanding support for the abortion ban. The commercial put the GOP candidate, then-Attorney General Daniel Cameron, on the defensive for weeks until the November election, which Beshear won in convincing fashion.

The Associated Press does not normally identify sexual assault victims, but Duvall chose to be identified and has spoken out publicly about what she experienced and its connection to the debate over abortion.

Turning her attention to winning over the legislature on Tuesday, Duvall noted that under current Kentucky law she would have had to carry her pregnancy to term.

“There are women and girls across Kentucky right now who are dealing with the same trauma that I went through,” she said. “Those women and girls need their choices. This bill will provide those.”

The debate about loosening Kentucky’s abortion ban comes after Republicans spent years adding restrictions to the procedure. Once the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a state trigger law passed years before took effect. It bans abortions in Kentucky except when carried out to save the life of the mother.

Since this year’s legislative session convened last week, prominent Republicans have talked about how it’s a deeply personal issue for their colleagues. House Speaker David Osborne recently referred to abortion as a “hotly debated issue” with “lots of strong opinions” among GOP members.

Democratic state Sen. David Yates, the lead sponsor of the new exceptions bill, denounced Kentucky’s abortion law as among the nation’s most restrictive. His legislation would provide “a very small step in the right direction for a very limited number of victims that we can help,” he said Tuesday.

Kentucky is one of 14 states currently enforcing a ban on abortion at all stages of pregnancy. Two more have similar bans on hold in court. And two others have bans that kick in when cardiac activity can be detected –- at about six weeks gestational age and before women often realize they are pregnant.

Several of the laws were adopted when the U.S. Supreme Court still found a nationwide right to abortion under the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision and took effect only after that precedent was overturned with the new ruling in 2022.

The laws in states with the deepest restrictions are divided over the exceptions. Most allow abortion when the woman’s life is in immediate danger, though a recent ruling said that Texas does not have to do so. Some have them for pregnancies caused by rape or incest and some do not. A few states allow abortion in the case of rape but not incest. There are also contrasting policies over whether abortions are allowed when there is a fatal fetal anomaly.

In Kentucky, abortion access remained virtually shut off after the state’s Supreme Court refused to halt the ban last year. The justices, however, ruled on narrow legal issues and left unanswered larger constitutional questions about whether access to abortion should be legal. In 2022, Kentucky voters rejected a ballot measure aimed at denying any constitutional protections for abortion.

Last month, a woman in Kentucky sued demanding the right to an abortion. But her attorneys later withdrew the lawsuit after the plaintiff learned her embryo no longer had cardiac activity.

Beshear, an abortion-rights supporter, said Tuesday he would immediately sign the new exceptions bill if it reaches his desk. The rape and incest exceptions would ensure that “those that have been harmed and violated in the worst of ways have options,” the governor said.

In comments echoing her hard-hitting message for Cameron last year, Duvall called on lawmakers to think about the “real world implications” of the current abortion ban.

“I’m here with a clear message to say that unless you’ve been in this position you have no idea what any woman or girl is currently going through,” she said Tuesday. “So there should be options. The legislators shouldn’t feel entitled to force victims who have stories like mine to carry a baby of their rapist.”

Associated Press writer Geoff Mulvihill in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, contributed to this report.

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Kentucky

No. 12/13 Kentucky Tops Wright State on Friday

Published

4 hours ago

December 20, 2025

Press Room

No. 12/13 Kentucky Tops Wright State on Friday

Clara Strack scored 26 points and grabbed seven rebounds as No. 12/13 Kentucky thumped Wright State 96-53 on Friday night inside Historic Memorial Coliseum.

Three other Cats also scored in double figures. Tonie Morgan had 18 points, six rebounds and six assists. Freshman Kaelyn Carroll made six threes on her way to a career-high 18 points. Asia Boone hit five threes en route to a 17-point night.

Wright State scored first on a three, but Kentucky got baskets from Strack and Morgan to lead 4-3. After WSU scored, Amelia Hassett drained a three and the Cats led 7-5. Wright State tied the game at 7-7 before Morgan and Strack scored to give UK an 11-7 lead. However, Wright State scored the next four to tie the game again.

Strack made two free throws, and Morgan made one, to give the Cats a three-point lead. A Boone three extended the lead to 17-11. Strack scored two more buckets and the Cats had a double-digit advantage. A Morgan three-point play capped the 13-0 run that gave UK a 24-11 lead. Kentucky would lead 31-13 after one quarter.

Wright State opened the second quarter with an 11-4 run to cut the Kentucky lead to 35-24. However, the Cats responded in a big way. Threes from Josie Gilvin and Boone gave UK a 17-point lead. A Morgan layup, two Strack free throws, and threes from Strack and Carroll (three times) compiled a 22-0 run that ended the half. Kentucky led 57-24 at the break and Strack led all scorers with 18 in the first 20 minutes.

In the third quarter, WSU scored first on a free throw but a Strack basket gave the Cats a 59-25 lead. After three Wright State points, UK got layups from Morgan and Jordan Obi to lead 63-28. After a Raiders’ three, Kentucky went on an 11-4 run, sparked by another three from Carroll, to lead 74-35. The Cats would lead 74-37 after three quarters.

Kentucky scored first in the final stanza on a Strack basket. After WSU scored twice, Carroll hit another three to make it 79-41. Kentucky would build the lead to as many as 46 (96-50) before settling for the 43-point victory.

The Cats now take a break for the holidays before hosting Hofstra on December 28. Tipoff for that game is set for 2 p.m. ET and the game can be seen on SEC Network Plus.

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Kentucky

Kentucky will have Flexible Recruiting Operation in New Territories

Published

17 hours ago

December 19, 2025

Press Room

Kentucky will have Flexible Recruiting Operation in New Territories

Will Stein‘s play-calling mantra is simple: Feed the Studs. It only works if you have studs. Kentucky must acquire talent to be competitive. It starts in the upcoming transfer portal, but there are long-term deficits that must be remedied by high school recruiting. Stein is building a staff that has cut its teeth on the trail.

One of the first things we learned about Joe Price, the new Kentucky wide receivers coach, is that he is known in the Lone Star State as East Side Joe. That is a reference to his hometown of Houston, a talent hotbed in the state of Texas. Safeties coach Josh Christian-Young just spent a couple of years at Houston after four years in New Orleans at Tulane.

New offensive line coach Cutter Leftwich first called Denton, Texas, home. He played college football in Louisiana at McNeese State, and spent time coaching at UTSA and North Texas. Kentucky’s two new coordinators each cultivated reputations as excellent recruiters and are coming to Lexington via the state of Texas and Louisiana.

Are you picking up the geographical theme yet?

Texas and Louisiana produce some of the most talented football players in America, not only in terms of quality, but quantity. In the 2025 On300 rankings, Texas led the way with 42 players, while Louisiana contributed a dozen, tied for the sixth-most. The issue is that Kentucky hasn’t gotten a lot of those players over the years. Might a tide finally be turning?

Sloan has Adaptable Recruiting Pitch

Within his first 24 hours on the job, Joe Sloan flipped four-star wide receiver Kenny Darby from LSU to Kentucky. Sloan’s connections in the state of Louisiana quickly paid dividends. He cultivated those connections for more than a decade in the Boot, but those weren’t always there for the former East Carolina quarterback from Virginia.

“I was 26 years old when Skip Holtz hired me at Louisiana Tech, and I had never been to Louisiana. He said, ‘Hey, what do you think about recruiting Baton Rouge?’ I said, ‘All right, that sounds good to me,’” Sloan recalled on Wednesday.

“He gave me, it was really nice a Crown Vic. The first one, it was a light baby blue. The second one was red, cherry red. It was nice; rolled down there and we started just developing relationships.”

You can expect Stein’s staff to lean on prior relationships to bring players to Kentucky. Jay Bateman has plenty of those in the DMV, the same region where the Wildcats recruited Josh Paschal. However, Kentucky can’t just rely on Texas, Louisiana, and the DMV to build a roster. Sloan believes this staff has the tools to adapt and find the best players from near and far to suit up in Kentucky blue.

“Recruiting it’s a people business. Coaches, mentors, and family members, they want to know that you have a plan for their son, on and off the field, to develop them to their fullest potential. What I look forward to is the opportunity to develop relationships right in all the areas that we’re going to recruit. I think that’s what it’s going to be,” said Sloan.

“That’s what it’s about, having open doors, answering the phone, creating relationships, and developing a trust with the people around the players that we’re going to recruit, that we’re going to take care of those young men. That’s what I’m going to do, that’s what I’ll continue to do, and that’s what we’ll do here at Kentucky as an entire program. So in terms of, I don’t know that it’s just one area, it’s more about the ability to develop those relationships and the excitement to do that, and I’m fired up.”

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Kentucky

Kentucky outlasts Wisconsin 3-2 in five-set thriller

Published

1 day ago

December 19, 2025

Press Room

Kentucky outlasts Wisconsin 3-2 in five-set thriller

No. 1 Kentucky outlasted No. 3 Wisconsin 3-2 in the five-set thriller to earn a trip the the NCAA national championship. The Wildcats clinch their first national final appearance since winning the title in the Spring of 2021 and second in program history.

In front of a sold-out T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, MO., Big Blue rallied in a dramatic fashion after a devastating 25-12 loss in Set 1. Kentucky was able to punch back in Set 2, earning the 25-22 victory before dropping the next set 25-21 to the Badgers.

With their backs against the wall, the Cats fought off a rallying Wisconsin team for the 26-24 Set 4 victory to push the match to five.

With momentum on their side, Kentucky took back what it lost in the first and fired on all cylinders in the fifth. The Cats raced out to a 6-1 lead early in the fifth before clinching the 15-13 win, hitting a match-best .409.

Outside Eva Hudson powered 29 kills on .455 hitting with seven digs, two blocks and a service ace to power the Kentucky winm while Brooklyn DeLeye tallied 15. The Big Blue defense made the difference, registering eight big-time blocks against a career-night by Wisconsin’s Mimi Colyer.

With the Wildcat win, Kentucky clinches a spot in the national championship to face No. 3 Texas A&M for the first ever all-SEC final in NCAA women’s volleyball history.

KENTUCKY TO THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP AFTER A FIVE-SET THRILLER 😱#NCAAWVB x 🎥 ESPN / @KentuckyVB pic.twitter.com/RJNIv2eumg
— NCAA Women’s Volleyball (@NCAAVolleyball) December 19, 2025