The issue of abortion was the subject of a marked exchange of words between the two candidates for the American presidency during their first debate on Tuesday, with the Democratic candidate, Kamala Harris, accusing her Republican rival, Donald Trump, of spreading a “web of lies” on the subject.
“I warned that we were going to hear a pack of lies and it’s not really a surprise. You have to understand what we have here: Donald Trump hand-picked three members of the Supreme Court knowing that they would end the protection [du droit à l’avortement partout aux États-Unis] and they did exactly what they expected,” the Democratic candidate said.
Mme Harris also said the Democratic candidate was being “insulting to women” by claiming that women could have abortions close to the end of their pregnancy.
“Nowhere in America does a woman go to term and ask for an abortion. It never happens. It’s insulting to the women of America,” she insisted.
The American vice president then launched into a vigorous plea denouncing the consequences on the lives of American women of the cancellation, in June 2022, of the Supreme Court ruling which guaranteed the right to abortion throughout the United States.
Former President Trump has boasted in the past that his appointment of three conservative justices to the Supreme Court helped bring about this reversal.
But in the face of repeated criticism from Democrats and the support of a majority of public opinion for the right to abortion, he is now careful to present himself as a defender of “reproductive rights.”
The issue of protecting the right to abortion is central to the duel between Trump and Harris, who continues to denounce the Republican’s about-faces.
The latter is also accused by conservatives of having betrayed the anti-abortion movement by adjusting his position on this key theme of the election.