Republicans have chosen first-term Alabama senator Katie Britt, the youngest Republican woman ever to serve in the Senate, to deliver the rebuttal to the State of the Union address tonight.
At 42, Britt is also the third-youngest senator serving today, presenting a counterpoint to the oldest sitting president.
Her rebuttal will come on the heels of a high-stakes political showdown over women’s access to in vitro fertilization in her home state.
After Alabama’s supreme court ruled that frozen embryos preserved for IVF “are children” under state law, Britt told reporters that “defending life and ensuring continued access to IVF services for loving parents are not mutually exclusive,” pushing for changes to state and federal law to protect the procedure.
Alabama’s legislature subsequently wrote new legislation intended to do so, which Governor Kay Ivey signed into law on Wednesday.
Britt was elected to the Senate in 2022. Her political fortunes can be attributed in part to her astute balancing act navigating relationships with Alabama’s business elite as a consummate political insider, while connecting herself to president Donald Trump and Trumpist populism as a candidate.
She also got lucky. Her opponent in the race, Mo Brooks, had Trump’s endorsement to succeed the retiring senator Richard Shelby, but squandered an early polling lead. Trump withdrew his endorsement mid-race, and the business-backed Britt swept into place.
Britt has two school-age children with her husband, former San Diego Chargers offensive tackle Wesley Britt.
Her political resume began in high school, when she was elected in 1999 by the delegates of Alabama Girls State program to be their governor . The high school valedictorian graduated from the University of Alabama as student body president in 2004. After a stint serving as former Shelby’s communications chief, she earned a law degree there in 2013.
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
