Trump says abortion should be decided by US states and declines to endorse national ban
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Donald Trump said abortion limits should be left to the US states in a video released on Monday.
The former US president who is once again running for office declined to endorse a national ban after months of mixed messages and speculation.
“My view is now that we have abortion where everybody wanted it from a legal standpoint, the states will determine by vote or legislation or perhaps both," Trump said in a video posted on his Truth Social site.
"And whatever they decide must be the law of the land — in this case, the law of the state".
Trump's endorsement of the patchwork approach leaves him open to being attached to the strictest proposed state legislation, which current President Joe Biden and his reelection campaign have already been working to do.
In the video, Trump again took credit for the US Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v Wade in 2022, saying he was "the person responsible" for ending the right to an abortion.
Trump also thanked the conservative justices who overturned it by name but again said he supported three exceptions in cases of rape, incest, and when the mother's life is at risk.
“Many states will be different. Many will have a different number of weeks or some will have more conservative than others and that’s what they will be," he said.
“At the end of the day it's all about will of the people," he added.
Disagreements over Trump's position
The announcement declining endorsement of a national ban drew immediate condemnation from SBA Pro-Life America, one of the US' most prominent groups opposed to abortion rights.
“We are deeply disappointed in President Trump’s position,” said the group's president, Marjorie Dannenfelser, in a statement.
“Unborn children and their mothers deserve national protections and national advocacy from the brutality of the abortion industry. The Dobbs decision clearly allows both states and Congress to act".
Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, one of Trump's congressional backers and supporter of a 15-week national ban on abortion, said he “respectfully” disagreed with Trump over abortion being an issue for the states.
Biden's campaign, meanwhile, said Trump was “endorsing every single abortion ban in the states, including abortion bans with no exceptions".
“And he’s bragging about his role in creating this hellscape,” campaign spokesperson Ammar Moussa said on X.
In a statement, Biden said Trump has played a part in being “responsible for creating the cruelty and the chaos that has enveloped America since the Dobbs decision,” a situation he said is reflected in women “being turned away from emergency rooms, forced to go to court to seek permission for the medical attention they need, and left to travel hundreds of miles for health care".
More than a dozen Republican-controlled states have banned abortion since Roe v Wade was overturned. Others have prohibited the procedure on increasingly diminishing timelines.
Other reproductive-related procedures have faced restrictions, including in vitro fertilisation (IVF) after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos can be considered children. Trump said he strongly supports IVF availability.
Democrats, meanwhile, believe the fight over abortion rights helps them at the polls and have outperformed expectations in elections since.
Voters in seven states have sided with abortion rights supporters on ballot measures, and abortion is expected to be on the ballot in more states this year, including Florida, Maryland and New York.
