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Former President\u00a0Donald Trump<\/a>\u00a0said he believes\u00a0abortion<\/a>\u00a0should be left to the states in a video released Monday morning outlining his position after months of mixed messages and speculation.<\/p>\n \u201cMany people have asked me what my position is on abortion and abortion rights,\u201d Trump said in the video posted on his Truth Social site. \u201cMy 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 \u2014 in this case, the law of the state.\u201d<\/p>\n Trump, in the video, did not say when in pregnancy he believes abortion should be banned \u2014 declining to endorse a national cutoff that would have been used as a cudgel by Democrats ahead of\u00a0the November election<\/a>. But Trump\u2019s endorsement of the patchwork approach leaves him open to being attached to the strictest proposed state legislation, which President Joe Biden and his reelection campaign have already been working to do.<\/p>\n In the video, Trump again took credit for\u00a0the U.S. Supreme Court\u2019s decision to end Roe v. Wade<\/a>, saying that he was \u201cproudly the person responsible for the ending\u201d of the constitutional right to an abortion and thanking the conservative justices who overturned it by name.<\/p>\n While he again articulated his support for three exceptions \u2014 in cases of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is at risk \u2014 he went on to describe the current legal landscape, in which different states have different restrictions following the court\u2019s Dobbs v. Jackson Women\u2019s Health Organization ruling on June 24, 2022, which upended the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.<\/p>\n \u201cMany states will be different. Many will have a different number of weeks or some will have more conservative than others and that\u2019s what they will be,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the end of the day it\u2019s all about will of the people.\u201d<\/p>\n The announcement drew immediate condemnation from SBA Pro-Life America, one of the country\u2019s most prominent groups opposed to abortion rights.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are deeply disappointed in President Trump\u2019s position,\u201d said the group\u2019s president, Marjorie Dannenfelser, in statement. \u201cUnborn children and their mothers deserve national protections and national advocacy from the brutality of the abortion industry. The Dobbs decision clearly allows both states and Congress to act.\u201d<\/p>\n Biden\u2019s campaign said Trump was \u201cendorsing every single abortion ban in the states, including abortion bans with no exceptions.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnd he\u2019s bragging about his role in creating this hellscape,\u201d campaign spokesperson Ammar Moussa said on X<\/a>.<\/p>\n Trump had\u00a0suggested last month<\/a>\u00a0in a radio interview that he was leaning toward\u00a0supporting a national abortion ban<\/a>\u00a0at around 15 weeks of pregnancy \u2014 early in the second trimester.<\/p>\n \u201cThe number of weeks now, people are agreeing on 15. And I\u2019m thinking in terms of that,\u201d he said on WABC radio. \u201cAnd it\u2019ll come out to something that\u2019s very reasonable. But people are really, even hard-liners are agreeing, seems to be, 15 weeks seems to be a number that people are agreeing at.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same time, Trump seemed reluctant to embrace a federal ban.<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody agrees \u2014 you\u2019ve heard this for years \u2014 all the legal scholars on both sides agree: It\u2019s a state issue. It shouldn\u2019t be a federal issue, it\u2019s a state issue,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, had written on his social media site Sunday night that he planned to issue a statement on \u201cabortion and abortion rights\u201d after sidestepping questions about when in a pregnancy he believes the line should be drawn.<\/p>\n Republican-led states have ushered in\u00a0a wave of new restrictions<\/a>\u00a0following the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022.\u00a0Democrats believe the fight over abortion rights helps them at the polls<\/a>\u00a0and have outperformed expectations in elections since.<\/p>\n Trump had long argued that the Supreme Court\u2019s decision overturning Roe gave those who oppose abortion rights \u201ctremendous power to negotiate.\u201d He said he wanted to use that leverage to strike a deal that he hoped would \u201cmake both sides happy\u201d and bring the country \u201ctogether\u201d \u2014 even though the issue is one of the most contentious in American politics, with opponents viewing abortion as murder and proponents seeing it as a fundamental women\u2019s right.<\/p>\n Trump has tried to thread the needle on abortion throughout the campaign. He routinely takes credit for appointing the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade, which he has called a \u201cmoral and unconstitutional atrocity,\u201d and has called himself the \u201cmost pro-life president in American history.\u201d<\/p>\n But he has also repeatedly criticized fellow Republicans for being too hard-line on the issue, blaming candidates who did not allow for exceptions in cases of rape, incest and when the life of the pregnant person is at risk for the party\u2019s losses that November.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of politicians who are pro-life do not know how to discuss this topic and they lose their election. We had a lot of election losses because of this, because they didn\u2019t know to discuss it. They had no idea,\u201d he said at the Concerned Women of America 2023 Leadership Summit.<\/p>\n In the video, Trump told Republicans that they must \u201cfollow your heart on this issue. But remember, you must also win elections to restore our culture and, in fact, to save our country, which is currently and very sadly a nation in decline.\u201d<\/p>\n Instead, he has tried to paint Democrats as the ones who are extreme on the issue.<\/p>\n \u201cIt must be remembered that the Democrats are the radical ones on this position,\u201d he said in the video.<\/p>\n Democrats and\u00a0President Joe Biden\u2019s campaign, meanwhile, have been spotlighting<\/a>\u00a0the issue as they work to draw a contrast with Trump.<\/p>\n Polling has consistently shown that most Americans believe abortion should be legal through the initial stages of pregnancy. About half of U.S. adults said abortions should be permitted at the 15-week mark, according to\u00a0an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted last June<\/a>.<\/p>\n Data compiled<\/a>\u00a0by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that the vast majority of abortions from 2012 to 2021 were performed within the first 13 weeks of pregnancy.<\/p>\n The Supreme Court\u2019s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision established the constitutional right to abortion until the time of viability, at around 23 or 24 weeks into pregnancy.<\/p>\n Abortions later in pregnancy are rare and are often performed due to serious fetal abnormalities, when the life of the mother is at risk, or when women have faced significant delays accessing the procedure, according to the\u00a0health policy research firm KFF<\/a>.<\/p>\n ___ <\/p>\n Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price contributed to this report.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\nSubscribe to the new Fortune CEO Weekly Europe newsletter to get corner office insights on the biggest business stories in Europe. Sign up<\/a> for free.<\/div>\n