State Auditor Andrew Sorrell believes that Alabama mothers who are still breastfeed their children should not be forced to sit through jury duty, and he’s once again pushing for the Legislature to act on the issue.
In 2021 and 2022, when Sorrell was a state representative, he carried a bill that would exempt nursing mothers from having to participate in jury duty. Sorrell is now spreading the word on the issue by telling the stories of nursing moms who were still forced to show up for jury duty in recent years in Alabama.
“[I] got it to committee,” Sorrell said Wednesday on WVNN. “And to my greatest surprise, in committee, what happened was other legislators were saying things like, ‘Well, do you have any stories of where this has actually happened? Do you have any examples you can give us of nursing moms who have not been exempted from jury duty?’ And I said, ‘No, not off top of my head, but I’m sure it’s happened.’ You know, it’s 5 million people in Alabama. This is definitely happening.”
One Alabama mother who was affected by this is Kandace Brown, who is now joining Sorrell in this effort by telling her story. She explained how she was told she had to come back without the child anyway.
“And I said, ‘If I’m still breastfeeding, I’m going to have to. I don’t have a choice,’” Kandance recounted. “She can’t eat. She can’t get nourishment if it’s not from me. She said, ‘Well, you can pump them.’ And so the court trying to dictate how I feed my child was just appalling, and so I left, I made a Facebook post. Had no idea how it would blow up, but I’m thankful, because I would not want any other mother to experience what I did.”
Sorrell said State Rep. Susan DuBose (R-Hoover) will be carrying this bill in the 2025 Legislative session.
“How about the government doesn’t get to dictate to you how you feed your child,” Sorrell said. “This is America. You should have the freedom and liberty if you want to breastfeed your child up to, you know, two years old, I think that’s an appropriate if you are a breastfeeding mom with a child under two, you should be exempt from jury duty.”
Sorrell also believes this is a bill that should get bipartisan support.
“This isn’t a Republican or Democrat thing,” he argued. “It bothers me. The State of Alabama claims to be pro-life, pro-family. This is the most anti-family thing currently on the books in Alabama. And you can be upset with these judges all you want, and I am upset with them for especially for the way they treated a citizen, but the fact is, they didn’t violate the law here.
Yaffee is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts “The Yaffee Program” weekdays 9-11 a.m. on WVNN. You can follow him on Twitter @Yaffee
