Vice President Kamala Harris utilized her initial campaign rally after President Joe Biden’s exit from the 2024 race to promote a discredited assertion that former President Donald Trump plans to implement a countrywide “prohibition” on abortion.
“We who believe in reproductive freedom will stop Donald Trump’s extreme abortion bans because we trust women to make decisions about their own bodies and not have their government tell them what to do,” Harris told a crowd.
Harris persists in reiterating this inaccurate statement, even mentioning it in a recent post on X earlier this month: “Donald Trump would ban abortion nationwide,” she wrote. “President [Joe Biden] and I will do everything in our power to stop him and restore women’s reproductive freedom.”
Several news outlets including CNN, BBC, The Associated Press, and The New York Times, have all reported on the claim and refuted it. Users have used Community Notes, a feature on the platform, to provide context to posts that are inaccurate or lacking in it. Elon Musk, the former CEO, and a supporter of Trump, also accused her of “lying.”
“When will politicians, or at least the intern who runs their account, learn that lying on this platform doesn’t work anymore?” Musk wrote.
Trump has emphasized that it is up to individual states to determine abortion restrictions. In a video released earlier this year, he elaborated on his stance regarding Truth Social.
“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,” Trump said.
Trump proposed implementing limitations on abortion after a specific stage in pregnancy, approximately at 15 weeks. In contrast to Trump’s usual lengthy speeches, Harris’s speech at the event lasted only about eighteen minutes. She began by commending Wisconsin’s importance as a battleground state.
