Tim Walz is expected to provide receipts for JD Vance’s anti-abortion stance on VP debate

Another stage of the debate in 2022 is the then-Governor of Minnesota Tim Waltz took his opponent, the Republican, with him Scott Jensenon the question of abortion rights. Jensen had recently changed his tone on access to reproductive health care and tried to tone down his rhetoric to appeal to voters. Walz didn’t have it.

“Throughout my career, I have trusted women to make their health decisions,” Walz said at the time in her only televised prime-time debate. “I don’t think anyone sitting in this office should be standing between them.”

“I just want to be very clear: This is on the ballot,” Walz added. “It will have an impact on generations to come.”

In just a few days, on October 1, Walz will take the debate stage again – this time against another man who has tried to walk back his anti-abortion comments: the Ohio senator and Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance.

In an interview with the Associated Press, Jensen, who lost to Walz by nearly eight percentage points, talked about what it was like debating Walz and how the governor and senator should approach Tuesday’s matchup.

Jensen said he believes Walz will be “loud and clear” on the issue of abortion access.

“And JD Vance needs to make it very clear that there will be no federal ban on abortion,” Jensen added. “That’s what Trump said, and they need to make that very clear.”

In the presidential debate earlier this month, three-time Republican nominee Donald Trump repeatedly failed to answer whether he would veto national abortion ban laws if they landed on his desk.

Among Republicans, abortion is touted as a “states’ rights” issue – but even Trump doesn’t follow it. While in office, Trump expressed support for a 20-week federal ban, and when he ran this time he previously said he was open to a 15-week ban.

“If only I could get a yes or no,” the ABC News anchor said Linsey Davis Trump urged on the debate stage. “Because your vice president, JD Vance, said you would veto it if it came to your desk.”

“Well, to be fair, I haven’t discussed it with JD,” Trump replied.

The former president repeatedly bragged about appointing three of the five Supreme Court justices who were vacated Roe v. Wade. Trump – and Vance followed him – has shifted his rhetoric on abortion to appear less extreme on the issue. This week at a rally, Trump even baselessly claimed that women “will be protected and I will be your protector.” Women will be happy, healthy, confident and free. They will no longer think about abortion.”

In his own debate in 2022, when Vance was running for Congress, he said that “some national minimum standard” on abortion “is totally fine with me.” After Texas passed its six-week ban in 2021, Vance announced the legislation, saying: “We want women to have opportunities, we want women to have choices, but most of all we want women and little boys in the womb to have that “To be right.” to live.” He also described the political movement for abortion rights as “sociopathic.”

During the election campaign, Walz continued to support abortion rights.

“Do you like that [policy] Where women are dying because they’re not getting the health care they should be getting when they need reproductive health care?” Walz said this month at the headquarters of the Macon-Bibb County Democrats in Georgia.

In January 2023, Walz signed a bill that adds a new layer of security to abortion rights and ensures that the state’s existing protections will remain in place even if the makeup of Minnesota’s courts someday changes.

During Walz’s speech at the Democratic National Convention in August, he cited his gubernatorial record on abortion rights.

“We also protected reproductive freedom because in Minnesota we respect our neighbors and the personal choices they make,” he said. “And even if we wouldn’t make the same decisions for ourselves, we have one golden rule: mind your own damn business.”