From left to proper: former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, former President Donald Trump, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and Vivek Ramaswamy. Republican candidates proceed to be pressed on abortion rights on the marketing campaign path.
Joe Raedle/Getty Pictures; Brandon Bell/Getty Pictures; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Pictures; Scott Olson/Getty Pictures; Justin Sullivan/Getty Pictures
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Joe Raedle/Getty Pictures; Brandon Bell/Getty Pictures; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Pictures; Scott Olson/Getty Pictures; Justin Sullivan/Getty Pictures
From left to proper: former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, former President Donald Trump, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and Vivek Ramaswamy. Republican candidates proceed to be pressed on abortion rights on the marketing campaign path.
Joe Raedle/Getty Pictures; Brandon Bell/Getty Pictures; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Pictures; Scott Olson/Getty Pictures; Justin Sullivan/Getty Pictures
Maybe no problem is thornier for the 2024 Republican presidential major candidates than abortion.
Republicans broadly cheered the 2022 Supreme Courtroom determination, Dobbs v. Jackson Girls’s Well being, that overturned Roe v. Wade. However since then, they’ve discovered that going too far on abortion restrictions generally is a political legal responsibility.
The Dobbs determination and subsequent state-level legal guidelines limiting abortion entry galvanized voters who assist abortion rights. Each state poll measure on abortion rights since Dobbs has come out in favor of abortion rights, even in pink states like Kansas, Kentucky and Ohio.
On high of that, the GOP’s opposition to abortion rights has been blamed for Republican underperformance within the 2022 midterms, and November’s elections in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Ohio.
Because of this, Republican presidential candidates try a balancing act: enchantment to a celebration base that, to various levels, opposes abortion rights, with out alienating moderates, independents and normal election voters who favor fewer restrictions. The end result has been many broad statements about “defending life,” and not using a entire lot of specifics about precisely what restrictions candidates favor.
For instance, former President Donald Trump, the main Republican candidate, has dodged the query of whether or not he helps a federal abortion ban, to not point out what sort of gestational limits he helps.
In the meantime, Democrats see defending abortion rights not solely as an ethical crucial however as a strategy to drive voters to the polls in 2024. Abortion rights advocates are working to place measures defending entry to the process onto ballots in 2024 in a number of swing states, within the hopes of energizing voters.
President Biden has by no means been a passionate crusader for abortion rights. However since Dobbs, he has been extra prepared to marketing campaign on the problem. The query is how a lot it continues to drive voters in 2024, and to what diploma different points – issues in regards to the financial system, Biden and Trump’s age, international conflicts – take over the dialog.
Does the candidate assist a federal abortion ban?
The best-profile query on abortion that candidates face is whether or not they would again a federal abortion ban. Earlier than he dropped out of the race, former Vice President Mike Pence challenged his rivals to signal on to a 15-week federal ban, and several other did. (Candidates have given a spread of solutions on what number of weeks the cutoff for such a ban can be; that’s addressed in one other part under.)
Trump has been notably evasive on the query, nevertheless. He has been requested a couple of federal ban a number of occasions, and whereas he has by no means mentioned “no” outright, he has additionally regularly refused to again a federal abortion ban.
That mentioned, he as soon as did again a federal ban – through the 2016 marketing campaign, he promised to signal a 20-week federal ban if it got here to his desk as president, and in 2018, President Trump pushed Congress to cross such a ban.
So what gestational limits, if any, does the candidate assist?
Since Dobbs, states have handed quite a lot of legal guidelines about how a lot to limit abortion, giving candidates many alternatives to both reward or criticize a spread of restrictions. As well as, a few of the candidates signed abortion bans as governors or supported restrictions as legislators. Under are the assorted ranges of abortion restrictions that candidates both at present assist or have supported previously.
Does the candidate assist restrictions on remedy abortion?
Previous to the Dobbs determination, remedy abortion accounted for a majority of all abortions within the U.S. Since Dobbs, abortion rights activists have been serving to sufferers, together with these in states with tight restrictions, get entry to the drugs utilized in these abortions – misoprostol and mifepristone. One technique is to ship the drugs to sufferers by way of the mail. In response, some states have handed legal guidelines making an attempt to restrict entry to these drugs.
The president has some energy to limit or develop entry to the drugs – Biden, for instance, signed an govt order in early 2023 that protected entry to remedy abortion by way of telehealth appointments, and that additionally allowed pharmacies to distribute the drugs.
As president, Trump pushed to limit remedy abortion through the COVID-19 pandemic, asking the Supreme Courtroom to require sufferers to go to a well being care supplier with a view to obtain the remedy.
The candidates have mentioned little about whether or not and the way they’d hope to limit entry to the drugs as president. NPR reached out to all campaigns about their stance on this matter and has not obtained responses.
What about exceptions within the case of rape, incest or the lifetime of the pregnant individual?
Whereas Republicans usually oppose abortion rights, many consider there must be particular instances during which a affected person ought to have broad abortion entry – specifically, when a being pregnant outcomes from rape or incest, or when an abortion would save a pregnant affected person’s life.
These three exceptions are common among the many Republican candidates, however some have supported or signed legal guidelines that both don’t include all three exceptions, or that include them to restricted extents. Nonetheless, all the remaining main candidates agree in offering these common exceptions. However, there’s nuance amongst their positions.
- Gov. Doug Burgum, R-N.D., signed a near-total abortion ban in North Dakota that included very restricted exceptions for rape and incest, permitting victims of these crimes to get abortions solely as much as six weeks of gestation. That regulation additionally allowed for abortion in instances that might save a affected person’s life or forestall extreme medical hurt.
- Former Gov. Chris Christie, R-N.J., advised Semafor in April 2023 that he helps exceptions in these three instances.
- Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., signed a six-week abortion ban that included exceptions for rape and incest as much as 15 weeks if a affected person might present documentation. The ban additionally contained an exception to save lots of a affected person’s life.
- As governor of South Carolina, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley signed an abortion ban that contained an exception to save lots of a affected person’s life, however no exceptions for rape or incest. Nevertheless, in June, a spokesperson mentioned she would signal a invoice that included these exceptions.
- Vivek Ramaswamy has mentioned he helps exceptions in these three instances, in line with Reuters.
- Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly mentioned on the marketing campaign path this cycle that he helps these three exceptions.
