False claim Trump said he'd force government monitoring on pregnant women | Fact check

BrieAnna J. Frank, USA TODAY
·3 min read
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

The claim: Trump told Time he’d force government monitoring on ‘every pregnant woman’ if elected in 2024

A May 1 Facebook post (direct link, archive link) from the liberal group Occupy Democrats claims former President Donald Trump unveiled a plan to keep tabs on pregnant women if he's elected to a second term.

“Trump just told TIME Magazine that in his second term as president he’d force every pregnant woman to submit to constant government monitoring to ensure she’s doing nothing to endanger her ‘unborn child’ – like, say, abortion,” reads the post, which is a quote from a post on X, formerly Twitter. “A vote for Trump is a vote for The Handmaid’s Tale!”

It received more than 2,500 shares in one day. The original post from Harvard Professor Laurence Tribe was also shared widely on X.

More from the Fact-Check Team: How we pick and research claims | Email newsletter | Facebook page

Our rating: False

Trump told Time magazine that potential abortion policies, including monitoring women’s pregnancies, should be left up to states to decide. He didn't push for monitoring or even say whether he was for or against the concept.

'The states are going to make those decisions,' Trump told Time

Trump did discuss abortion policy in an April 12 interview for a Time magazine cover story, but he did not say what the social media post claims.

When asked whether states should monitor women’s pregnancies to determine if they are in compliance with abortion laws, Trump said states “might do that” but that it was a decision the states would be permitted to make themselves, according to the magazine's interview transcript.

He avoided answering whether he would be comfortable with states prosecuting women who get abortions after the time period their states' laws allow.

“The states are going to say,” Trump said. “It’s irrelevant whether I’m comfortable or not. It’s totally irrelevant, because the states are going to make those decisions.”

Trump also declined to commit to vetoing federal abortion restrictions if Congress were to pass such legislation, a response that President Joe Biden's re-election campaign used to cast doubt on the future of abortion rights in a second Trump term.

The Time article reflects the interview transcript in saying Trump “would let red states monitor women’s pregnancies and prosecute those who violate abortion bans,” but it does not say the former president advocated for a federal pregnancy monitoring program.

Fact check: No, Brookings Institute didn't say Trump to blame for 70% of COVID-19 deaths

Trump in April had said he would not sign a federal abortion ban into law if re-elected and criticized an Arizona law banning abortion except for in cases where the mother's life is at risk as going "too far," USA TODAY reported. Arizona's governor has since signed a bill that repeals the ban.

USA TODAY has debunked an array of claims from Occupy Democrats, including an implication that a Maine state representative questioned the legality of Nazi Germany’s actions, a false claim that Trump increased the national debt more than any other president, and a misleading claim that 156 Republicans voted to raise the retirement age to 70.

USA TODAY reached out to Occupy Democrats for comment but did not receive a response. Tribe, the professor quoted in the Occupy Democrats post, defended his statement to USA TODAY and said the states' rights argument was similarly used to justify slavery.

"I think mine was a fair characterization of what he has told women to expect of him on this issue," Tribe said.

Snopes also debunked the claim.

Our fact-check sources:

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or e-newspaper here.

USA TODAY is a verified signatory of the International Fact-Checking Network, which requires a demonstrated commitment to nonpartisanship, fairness and transparency. Our fact-check work is supported in part by a grant from Meta.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: False claim Trump said he'd force pregnancy monitoring | Fact check