Sen. JD Vance, the Republican vice presidential nominee, defended recent comments by former President Donald Trump that seemed to indicate an openness to rolling back access to abortion pills, saying Trump “wants these decisions to be made by the states.”
“I think his view on this has been very clear,” Vance said on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” and noted that Trump, who made the remarks about the abortion medication at his news conference last Thursday, said he had taken the question “in a loud room where he couldn’t hear the question super well.”
The former president has made it clear that he wouldn’t sign a federal abortion ban should he return to the White House, opting to leave the issue to the states. But he seemed to suggest some openness to federally restricting access to mifepristone, one of two drugs used in a regimen to terminate early-stage pregnancies, during a news conference last week.
When asked whether he would take other actions to restrict access to abortion other than a federal ban — like directing the FDA to roll back access to mifepristone — Trump gave a rambling response that appeared to leave the door open to some restrictions.
“Sure, you could, you could do things that will be, would supplement — absolutely. And those things are pretty open and humane,” Trump said in response. “There are many things on a humane basis that you can do outside of that, but you also have to give a vote, and the people are going to have to decide.”
Vance, an Ohio Republican who became Trump’s running mate last month, questioned whether Trump heard the question “super clearly,” while asserting that the former president has previously consistently said that he wants decisions on abortion to be left up to the states. He also said that he agrees with the Supreme Court’s decision on mifepristone earlier this year.
In June, the Supreme Court rejected a challenge targeting the availability of the widely used abortion pill based on legal standing, preserving access to the drug in its first major abortion-related ruling since the reversal of Roe v. Wade. The high court did not address whether the FDA acted lawfully when it took a series of steps in 2016 and 2021 that relaxed the rules for mifepristone’s use.
Trump has often celebrated the 2022 decision that rolled back abortion protections and struck down the landmark Roe v. Wade, taking credit for appointing the three justices who delivered the conservative majority that made the decision possible.
Vance said he agrees with the high court on the abortion pill matter, while noting that “what we really want” is for the federal government to respect the decisions of states and voters.
“That’s what President Trump has said is, consistently, we need to get out of the culture war side of the abortion issue,” Vance added. “We need to let the states decide their specific abortion policy.”
The Ohio Republican was among a group of lawmakers who signed onto a letter in 2023 urging the Justice Department to enforce the Comstock Act — an 1873 law that has become a primary focus of anti-abortion groups as a method to significantly restrict access to abortion pills. Vance said on “Face the Nation” that the letter was directed at having doctors prescribe the drug to “ensure that it’s safe.”
“We just want the FDA to make sure that doctors are prescribing this in a safe way,” Vance said. “That’s all that we ever said, and I believe that that is how President Trump feels about this.”