In a single week, former President Donald Trump espoused not once but twice the false claim that Democrats seeking to protect abortion rights allow for infants to be killed after they are born.
Back in July, Trump also falsely accused Vice President Kamala Harris of supporting the execution of babies. Trump, speaking in North Carolina during his first campaign rally after Harris became the likely Democratic presidential nominee, said, “She wants abortions in the eighth and ninth month of pregnancy, that’s fine with her, right up until birth, and even after birth – the execution of a baby.”
Harris has never said anything to endorse even anything remotely close to this notion. Post-birth termination of a baby is infanticide, which is illegal everywhere in the country. Trump has frequently claimed that some Democratic states allow such post-birth executions. That is categorically false as well.
In an interview with Fox News last week, when pressed about whether he would support Florida’s Amendment 4, a ballot measure that could enshrine a right to abortion in the state’s Constitution, and repeal the state’s six-week ban, Trump said, “You know, some of the states, like Minnesota and other states, have it where you can actually execute the baby after birth. And all of that stuff is unacceptable.”
On a campaign stop in Michigan that same week, Trump repeated the lie, saying, “In six states, you’re allowed to kill the baby after the baby is born. And, you know, one of those states is Minnesota.” Except no U.S. state, territory or commonwealth (of course, including Minnesota), allows for infanticide, or the killing of babies.
Nine states and the District of Columbia do not restrict abortion based on gestational duration, but according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only about 1% of all abortions performed in the U.S. are performed at or after 21 weeks of gestation. According to previous Teen Vogue reports, a person might obtain an abortion later in pregnancy, in the second or third trimester, for a number of reasons, including but not limited to: health and mortality risks for the pregnant person, a diagnosis of a fetal malformation or a genetic abnormality, barriers to accessing an abortion earlier, difficulty (or simply not knowing how to) track irregular periods.
Three years before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Trump seemingly first raised the demonstrably false concept of “post-birth abortion” during his 2019 State of the Union address, calling out then-Democratic Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam, who he claimed “stated he would execute a baby after birth.” Northam never indicated that an abortion could be performed after birth.
In a 2023 interview, Trump also falsely claimed, “You have New York state and other places that passed legislation where you’re allowed to kill the baby after birth.” This is not true, and no legislation of this kind has ever been passed or even introduced in the U.S.
In the wake of the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe, protecting abortion rights has become a deciding issue for many Americans. According to New York Times and Siena College polling last month, an increasing share of swing state voters, particularly women, say that abortion is their top decision-making issue in the election this fall.
Trump has repeatedly changed his position on the issue, despite taking credit for both appointing Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe and ultimately for the overturning of the decision generally. His shifting stance may reflect fears that the backlash to abortion restrictions may drive voters to the polls, which might explain his puzzling return to repeating the false claim about “post-birth abortion” (killing of a baby after birth), in recent days.
