In the months leading up to the 2024 presidential election, democratic pick U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, have made it a major talking point of their campaign that an administration under former President Donald Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, would put into place a national abortion ban.
For months, Trump appeared to evade answering these accusations directly, and after the Septemer 2024 presidential debate, multiple headlines declared that he refused to confirm whether he would veto a national ban on abortion. Then, during the Vance-Walz debate on Oct. 1, 2024, Trump confirmed via Truth Social that he "would not support a federal abortion ban, under any circumstances, and would, in fact, veto it."
Below, we break down exactly what claims Harris has made regarding Trump signing a national abortion ban, as well as Trump's evolving position on a national ban from 1999 to today.
Harris: Trump 'Will Sign a National Abortion Ban'
With Roe v. Wade overturned, the responsibility fell to individual states to restrict, ban, or protect abortion rights as they saw fit, and there it currently stands. However, Harris has claimed on many occasions that if Trump were reelected, he would take it a step further and attempt to ban access to abortion nationwide.
Most recently, while speaking at a rally in Atlanta, Georgia on Sept. 20, 2024, she said: "If [Trump] is elected again, I am certain he will sign a national abortion ban, which would outlaw abortion in every single state."
As the 2024 presidential race gained momentum, Trump's position, at times, took on more ambiguous tones. During the Sept. 10 presidential debate, when Harris said Trump would sign a national abortion ban if reelected, he denied it. "There she goes again, it's a lie. I'm not signing a ban, and there's no reason to sign a ban."
The full interaction went as follows, starting at minute 24:12 of the video below:
However, he also skirted the direct question, "Would you veto a national abortion ban?" twice, first claiming he wouldn't have to veto it because Congress would never pass such a ban. When moderator Lindsey Davis pointed out that Trump's running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, stated in an August 2024 interview with NBC that Trump would veto a national abortion ban if Congress passed such a ban, Trump responded: "Well, I didn't discuss it with JD In all fairness. JD — And I don't mind if he has a certain view, but I think he was speaking for me but I really didn't."
During the debate, Harris also claimed that "In his Project 2025 there would be a national abortion ban," which is not true; Project 2025 does not explicitly call for a national abortion ban. The Project does aim to severely limit access to abortions, such as by stopping the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from promoting abortion as health care and recommending the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) stop promoting and approving requests for manufacturing abortion pills.
Additionally, Trump has actively distanced himself from Project 2025's proposals. "I have nothing to do with Project 2025," he said during the debate with Harris. "That's out there. I haven't read it. I don't want to read it, purposely."
Standing in sharp contrast to Trump's at times vague and obfuscative approach to abortion policy, Harris has made reproductive rights central to her political identity throughout her career. In fact, her unwavering support for access to abortion is one of Harris' strongest appeals among voters, according to The New York Times.
In 2016, Trump promised to appoint Supreme Court justices who would overturn the court's 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that recognized a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy by abortion. As Trump promised, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, something he later claimed credit for on numerous occasions.
"For 54 years they were trying to get Roe v. Wade terminated, and I did it," he said during a 2024 Fox News town hall. "And I'm proud to have done it."
Has Trump Ever Supported a National Abortion Ban?
Trump's more recent statements notwithstanding, it bears pointing out that his public pronouncements on abortion rights have jumped all over the map since he first declared himself "pro-choice in every respect" on Meet the Press in 1999.
In his book "The America We Deserve," published in 2000, Trump said he would ban partial-birth abortion despite his "pro-choice instincts":
When Tim Russert asked me on Meet the Press if I would ban partial-birth abortion if I were president, my pro-choice instincts led me to say no. After the show, I consulted two doctors I respect and, upon learning more about this procedure, I have concluded that I would indeed support a ban. I have nothing to lose by expressing my opinions.
In 2018, Trump became the first president to speak at the annual March for Life anti-abortion rally. During his speech, he said he "strongly supported the House of Representative's Pain-Capable bill, which would end painful, late-term abortions nationwide." The bill proposed making it a crime for any person to perform or attempt to perform an abortion if the probable post-fertilization age of the fetus is 20 weeks or more. "I call upon the Senate to pass this important law and send it to my desk for signing," he said.
As recently as March 2024, while speaking on the WABC radio show "Sid & Friends in the Morning," Trump indicated that he might back a 15-week federal abortion ban with exceptions for rape, incest and life-threatening emergencies.
"The number of weeks, now, people are agreeing on 15, and I'm thinking in terms of that, and it'll come out to something that's very reasonable," he said. "But people are really — even hard-liners are agreeing, seems to be 15 weeks, seems to be a number that people are agreeing at. But I'll make that announcement at the appropriate time."
About a month prior to that, in February 2024, anonymous sources claimed Trump privately told advisers and allies that he liked the idea of a 16-week national abortion ban (with the same exceptions), according to reporting by The New York Times.
April 2024: Trump Says He Would Not Sign a National Abortion Ban
By April 2024, Trump appeared to have landed on a clear, firm stance: He declined to endorse a national abortion ban and said abortion policy should be left to the individual states.
In a video he posted to Truth Social on April 8, he said:
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. And whatever they decide must be the law of the land — in this case, the law of the state.
When ABC News asked Trump if he would sign a national abortion ban as he walked the tarmac on April 10, 2024, he appeared to simply answer: "No."
October 2024: Trump Confirms He Would Veto a Federal Abortion Ban
Finally, on Oct. 1, 2024, hours after the initial publication of this story – while Vance debated Walz on stage – Trump confirmed on Truth Social that he would not support a federal abortion ban under any circumstances, and would, in fact, veto it.
(Truth Social user @realDonaldTrump)
In sum, although Trump has flirted with the idea of a national abortion ban at various times, as of this writing in October 2024, Trump's public stance is that individual states should wield control over abortion policy and if a bill to ban abortion nationwide made it to his desk, he would veto it.