Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich and several Maryland lawmakers have sent letters to businesses in states that have outlawed abortion services, pitching Maryland as a place where companies and their employees would find a “welcoming, diverse and inclusionary place.”
Companies in Texas, Missouri, Kentucky and Tennessee were contacted, according to Elrich.
“If there’s a chance that company leaders are exploring a move out of those states, we want to make sure that they know that Montgomery County is a place they can come to where we do value a woman’s right to choose,” Elrich said.
State Del. Eric Luedtke, the House Majority leader in Annapolis, joined Elrich during the county executive’s weekly briefing to discuss the effort.
“If I want to attract the best talent, if I want to attract the best programmers, I need to be in a place where those programmers feel comfortable living,” Luedtke said.
Luedtke was asked if the companies, which included Tesla, Dell Technologies, AT&T and others, had responded to the pitch. He said the letters had just gone out this week but added that “Many of these business leaders have expressed publicly opposition to the Supreme Court decision.”
Maryland codified the right to abortions in a ballot referendum three decades ago. More recently, state Del. Ariana Kelly was the lead sponsor of the Abortion Care Access Act, which was designed to expand the number of abortion care providers in the state.
