Former President Donald Trump is refuting claims that he told a Time magazine reporter that states might monitor women to see whether they had had an abortion.
“I never said that ’some states may choose to monitor women’s pregnancies to possibly prosecute for violating any abortion bans.’ This was made up by Democrats and the Fake News Media,” Mr. Trump posted Sunday on Truth Social.
“After 50 years, Abortion is now up to the States, where everybody, Republican and Democrat, plus all legal scholars and experts, have wanted it to be,” he said. “The people choose, and many States, like Ohio and Kansas, have chosen. Many others are in the process of choosing.”
His social media post comes after he’s been criticized for a statement he made in an interview with Time last week. In the interview he was asked if “states should monitor women’s pregnancies so they can know if they’ve gotten an abortion.”
“I think they might do that. Again, you’ll have to speak to the individual states,” he said in the interview.
When asked again whether he would be comfortable with state’s monitoring women’s abortions, he said it’s up to the states and it’s “totally irrelevant” if he’s comfortable with it.
Democrats were quick to respond to the former president’s comments.
“Donald Trump’s latest comments leave little doubt: If elected he’ll sign a national abortion ban, allow women who have an abortion to be prosecuted and punished, allow the government to invade women’s privacy to monitor their pregnancies, and put IVF and contraception in jeopardy nationwide,” Julie Chavez Rodriguez, Biden campaign manager, said in a statement.
Mr. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, revealed last month that he didn’t favor a federal abortion ban, and that the decision should stay with the states.
He has often boasted about playing a role in the overturning of Roe v. Wade, since his Supreme Court nominees gave the panel a 6-3 conservative majority during his presidency.
“It is all working, will never go back to the Federal Government, and our Country will soon start uniting on this long contentious issue,” he said in his Sunday post. “At the same time, nobody wants to see abortion in the 7th, 8th, or 9th month or, execution after birth, as some states, like the former Democrat Governor of Virginia said, was permitted.”