Abortion: Donald Trump ‘wants to take America back to the 1800s’ and reaches out to Kamala Harris

Donald Trump “wants to take America back to the 1800s” when it comes to abortion, Kamala Harris said Friday during a trip to Arizona, where courts just upheld a nearly total 160-year-old abortion ban. “This is what Trump’s second term looks like: more restrictions, more suffering and less freedom,” said the American vice president.

Months before the November presidential election, abortion is becoming a major campaign issue in the United States, and especially in this key southwestern state, where Joe Biden beat Donald Trump by just 10,000 votes in 2020. An Arizona court on Tuesday upheld an 1864 law that bans abortions at conception unless the mother is in mortal danger.

Rape and incest are not considered valid exceptions. This text, dating back to the Civil War, a time when women did not have the right to vote, is controversial and embarrassing even among Republicans. However, its actual application remains highly uncertain, especially because Arizona’s attorney general has vowed not to prosecute any doctor or woman involved in abortion.

“Suppression of women’s rights and freedoms”

However, the threat of serious tightening exists. Kamala Harris called the decision “one of the greatest consequences” of the 2022 earthquake, when the U.S. Supreme Court struck down constitutional protections for abortion rights. The change, passed by conservative judges, some of whom were appointed by Donald Trump, was “just the first act of a broader strategy to crush women’s rights and liberties (… state by state), the Democratic vice president decried.

“Donald Trump is the architect of this health crisis,” she continued. “And this is not a fact that he is hiding. Moreover, he brags about it. »

Arizona is one of the few key states that will decide the presidential election. Democrats are making abortion a strong argument for the re-election of Joe Biden, whom Donald Trump is still trailing in the polls. A massive advertising campaign costing at least $1 million would target the southwestern state to portray the Democratic president as an outspoken pro-life advocate.

Banned or restricted in approximately twenty states

Over the past two years, about twenty American states have banned or severely limited access to abortion.

But this ideological victory turned into an electoral burden for the Republicans. Polls show a majority of Americans support abortion, weakening the Conservative Party in the election. Even voters in Kansas, a right-leaning state, recently backed abortion rights in a referendum.

Aware of the political risk, Donald Trump is now showing restraint, reminding that each state has the right to legislate on this issue. “The Arizona Supreme Court went too far in its decision on abortion,” he reiterated Friday on his social media platform Pravda. Arizona’s Republican-dominated Legislature must “move as quickly as possible” to pass the new law, he said. “Ideally we should have three exceptions: rape, incest and the life of the mother. It is important ! »

In his post, he portrayed Democrats as “extremists,” repeating the lie that the American left supports “the execution of infants, in some cases after birth.”

In Tucson, Kamala Harris reminded him of his virtual alliance with evangelical voters who support a total ban on abortion, as well as the uncertainty he has long maintained on the issue. “Donald Trump’s friends in the US Congress are trying to pass a national ban,” she recalled. “And now Trump wants us to believe he won’t sign a national ban? Enough of these manipulations! »