Former President Donald Trump said on April 10 that he would not sign a federal abortion ban if one is placed on his desk as president.
While in Atlanta on April 10 for a fundraiser, the former president was asked by a reporter if he would sign such a law if passed by Congress.
“No,” President Trump replied.
“You wouldn’t sign it?” the reporter asked again.
“No,” the former president repeated.
The exchange followed an earlier interaction with reporters after he landed in Atlanta. While answering questions on the tarmac, he was asked if the Arizona Supreme Court “went too far” in allowing a Civil War-era abortion ban to be enforced in the state.
“Yeah, they did, and that’ll be straightened out,” President Trump said. “As you know, it’s all about states’ rights. That’ll be straightened out, and I’m sure that the governor and everybody else are going to bring it back into reason, and that will be taken care of, I think, very quickly.”
He noted that he thought Florida’s six-week abortion limit, due to take effect on May 1, was also “probably going to change.”
“It’s the will of the people—this is what I’ve been saying. It’s a perfect system,” President Trump said. “For 52 years, people have wanted to end Roe v. Wade, to get it back to the states. We did that—it was an incredible thing, an incredible achievement. We did that, and now the states have it, and the states are putting out what they want. It’s the will of the people.”
The Arizona ruling came a day after the former president’s April 8 announcement that he believed that the legality of abortion should be decided by the people in each individual state, not the federal government. His stance rattled many in the pro-life movement, including some of his current and former allies.
“The pro-life movement has always been about the wellbeing of the unborn child—not geography,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) responded via X, formerly known as Twitter.
Mr. Graham, who has often been a defender of President Trump and his policies in the Senate, called on the presumptive GOP presidential nominee to get behind a federal 15-week abortion limit.
“The science is clear—a child at fifteen weeks is well-developed and is capable of feeling pain,” he wrote.
The former president did not take kindly to the criticism. Pushing back via his Truth Social platform, he railed against the senator for “doing a great disservice” to the GOP and America.
“Many Good Republicans lost Elections because of this Issue, and people like Lindsey Graham, that are unrelenting, are handing Democrats their dream of the House, Senate, and perhaps even the Presidency,” President Trump wrote.
Responding to President Trump’s latest statements on a federal ban, Mr. Graham told The Epoch Times that he thought it was the wrong approach.
“I think most Americans want to limit late-term abortions,” he said. “I think the pro-life movement is going to continue to advocate that late-term abortions are out of the mainstream of America and the world.”
Mr. Graham said Republican criticism of Democrats for wanting legal abortion “up to the moment of birth” without supporting any federal restrictions on the procedure “is probably not going sell to the pro-life community.”
Others on Capitol Hill said they agreed with President Trump’s stance.
“I think he’s right,” said Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), a vocal opponent of the Defense Department’s controversial abortion travel policy. “We don’t need—we screwed everything else up here [in Congress], we don’t need to screw up abortion.”
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) said he, too, thought the issue should be decided at the state level.
But Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) said he didn’t believe President Trump was being honest about his position on the matter.
“I mean, he wants to ban every abortion. He tries to pretend—he keeps shifting his views—but it’s very clear. He was the architect with the Supreme Court that ended Roe, and now he pretends ... ‘Well, it’s up to the states.’ And then, you know, tomorrow, he’s going to say, ‘Well, I support, you know, a national ban, and anything,’” Mr. Fetterman said.
