(The Hill) - Sally Field is opening up about her "horrific" experience of being molested while undergoing an abortion in Mexico as a teenager, saying the traumatic event is one of the reasons she's supporting Vice President Harris's White House bid.
"I feel still very shamed about it, because I was raised in the [1950s] and it's ingrained in me," the "Steel Magnolias" star said as she recounted a story about when she was 17-years-old in a video posted on Instagram on Sunday.
"I had no choices in my life. I didn't have a lot of family support in any way or finances," Field, 77, said to her 18,000 followers.
"And then I found out I was pregnant. Luckily, I had a family doctor who was a friend of the family, and he drove me and his wife and my mother in their brand new Cadillac to Tijuana."
The Academy Award winner said she had no anasthetic during the procedure: "I felt everything, how much pain I was in. And then I realized that the technician was actually molesting me. So I had to figure out, how can I make my arms move to push him away? So it was just this absolute pit of shame."
"When it was finished, they said, 'Go, go, go, go, go,' like the building was on fire. They didn't want me there — it was illegal," Field said.
A few months later, Field said, she landed the role of Gigdet in what would become the hit 1960s TV sitcom.
"In reality, I was the quintessential all-American girl next door, because so many young women, my generation of women, were going through this," she said.
"And these are the things that women are going through now, when they're trying to get to another state, they don't have the money, they don't have the means, and they don't know where they're going."
"It's beyond, how you can go back to that, and do that to our little girls, and our young women and not have respect and regard for their health and their own decisions about whether they feel they're able to give birth to a child at that time," Field said.
In 2022, the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade, overturning the nearly 50-year-old federal right to an abortion.
Former President Trump said in August that he had "no regrets" that his handpicked Justices ended Roe v. Wade. The 45th president said earlier this month that if he was reelected, he would veto a federal abortion ban.
Harris has blamed Trump for restrictive abortion laws including in states such as Georgia, following a report earlier this month that found an abortion-related death in the state was "preventable." The vice president's campaign as repeatedly argued that restoring reproductive freedoms are at stake in the 2024 race.
Voicing her support for Harris in a message accompanying her video, Field said, "We can't go back. We have to all stand up and fight."
