From left to right: former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, former President Donald Trump, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum and Vivek Ramaswamy. Republican candidates continue to push abortion rights on the campaign trail.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images. Brandon Bell/Getty Images; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images; Scott Olson/Getty Images; Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
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From left to right: former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, former President Donald Trump, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum and Vivek Ramaswamy. Republican candidates continue to push abortion rights on the campaign trail.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images. Brandon Bell/Getty Images; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images; Scott Olson/Getty Images; Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Perhaps no issue is more thorny for the 2024 Republican presidential candidates than abortion.
Republicans widely cheered the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Healthwhich was overturned Roe v. Wade. But they have since found that overreaching abortion restrictions can be a political liability.
The Dobbs decision and subsequent state-level laws restricting access to abortion galvanized voters who support abortion rights. Every state abortion rights measure since Dobbs has come out in favor of abortion rights, even in red states like Kansas, Kentucky and Ohio.
In addition, the GOP’s opposition to abortion rights has been blamed for Republican underperformance in the 2022 midterm elections and the November elections in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Ohio.
As a result, Republican presidential candidates are attempting a balancing act: how to appeal to a party base that, to varying degrees, opposes abortion rights, without alienating moderates, independents and general election voters who favor fewer restrictions. The result was a lot of general statements about “protecting life,” without much detail on the candidates’ preferred restrictions.
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For example, former President Donald Trump, the leading Republican candidate, has dodged the question of whether he supports a federal ban on abortion, let alone what kind of gestational limits he supports.
Meanwhile, Democrats see protecting abortion rights not just as a moral imperative, but as a way to get voters to the polls in 2024. Abortion rights advocates are working to pass measures to protect access to the procedure on the ballot in 2024 in many swing states, hoping to activate voters.
President Biden has never been a passionate crusader for abortion rights. But since Dobbs, he was more willing to campaign on the issue. The question is how much it continues to sway voters in 2024, and to what extent other issues β concerns about the economy, the age of Biden and Trump, foreign conflicts β are taking over the debate.
Does the candidate support a federal ban on abortion?
The most important abortion question facing the candidates is whether they would support a federal ban on abortion. Before dropping out of the race, former Vice President Mike Pence challenged his competitors to sign a 15-week federal ban, and several did. (Candidates have given a range of answers as to how many weeks would be the limit for such a ban; this is discussed in another section below.)
However, Trump was particularly evasive on the question. He has been asked about a federal ban many times, and while he has never said “no” outright, he has also consistently refused to support a federal ban on abortion.
That said, he once supported a federal ban β during the 2016 campaign promised to sign a 20-week federal ban if he reached office as president, and in 2018, President Trump pushed Congress to pass such a ban.
So what gestational limits, if any, does the candidate support?
Since Dobbs, states have passed a variety of abortion restriction laws, giving candidates plenty of opportunity to either praise or criticize a range of restrictions. In addition, some of the candidates signed abortion bans as governors or supported restrictions as legislators. Here are the different levels of abortion restrictions that the candidates either currently support or have supported in the past.
Does the candidate support restrictions on medication abortion?
Before the Dobbs decision, medication abortions were accounted for a majority of all abortions in the US by Dobbs, abortion rights activists have helped patients, including those in states with strict restrictions, gain access to the pills used in these abortions β misoprostol and mifepristone. One method is to mail the pills to patients. In response, some states have passed laws that try to limit access to these pills.
The president has some power to limit or expand access to the pills β Biden, for example, signed an executive order in early 2023 that protected access to medication abortion through telehealth appointments and also allowed pharmacies to dispense the pills.
As president, Trump pushed to limit medical abortion during the COVID-19 pandemic, asking the Supreme Court to require patients to see a health care provider to receive the drug.
The candidates have said little about whether and how they would hope to limit access to pills as president. NPR reached out to all of the campaigns about their stance on this issue and has not heard back.
What about the exceptions in the case of rape, incest or the life of the pregnant woman?
While Republicans generally oppose abortion rights, many believe there should be specific cases in which a patient should have broad access to abortion β particularly when a pregnancy results from rape or incest, or when an abortion would save a woman’s life. pregnant patient.
These three exemptions are popular among Republican candidates, but some have supported or signed laws that either do not contain all three exemptions or contain them to a limited extent. However, all other major candidates agree to provide these popular exemptions. However, there is a nuance to their positions.
- Gov. Doug Burgum, RN.D., signed a almost total ban on abortion in North Dakota that included very limited exceptions for rape and incest, allowing victims of these crimes to obtain abortions only up to six weeks’ gestation. This law also allowed abortion in cases where it would save a patient’s life or prevent serious medical harm.
- Former Gov. Chris ChristieRN.J., said Semafor in April 2023 that it supports exemptions in these three cases.
- Governor Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., signed a six-week abortion ban that exceptions included for rape and incest up to 15 weeks if the patient could provide documentation. The ban also contained an exception to save a patient’s life.
- As governor of South Carolina, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley; signed an abortion ban that contained an exception to save a patient’s life, but no exceptions for rape or incest. However, in Junea representative said he would sign a bill that would include those exemptions.
- Vivek Ramaswamy said he supports exemptions in these three cases, according to Reuters.
- Former President Donald Trump he’s got repeatedly said on the campaign trail this cycle that he supports those three exemptions.