Donald Trump calls for universal coverage of IVF treatment with no specifics on how his plan would work
Former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Terrace View Event Center in Sioux Center, Iowa, Friday, Jan. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

Election 2024 Trump
Trump also suggested that he would vote in favor of repealing Florida’s six-week abortion ban.

Former President Donald Trump says that, if he wins a second term, he wants to make IVF treatment free for women, but did not detail how he would fund his plan or precisely how it would work.

“I’m announcing today in a major statement that under the Trump administration, your government will pay for — or your insurance company will be mandated to pay for — all costs associated with IVF treatment,” he said at an event in Michigan. “Because we want more babies, to put it nicely.”

IVF treatments are notoriously expensive, and can cost tens of thousands of dollars for a single round. Many women require multiple rounds and there is no guarantee of success.

The announcement comes as Trump has been under intense criticism from Democrats for his role in appointing the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade, ending the constitutional right to an abortion in the country. The decision has led to a wave of restrictions across Republican-led states, including proposals that have threatened access to IVF by trying to define life as beginning at conception. IVF relies on the creation of multiple embryos, some of which may be destroyed.

Abortion is expected to be a major motivator for Democrats and women this November, and was a dominant theme of the party’s national convention last week, including Vice President Kamala Harris’ speech as she accepted her party’s nomination.

In response, Trump has been trying to present himself as more moderate on the issue, going as far as to declare himself “very strong on women’s reproductive rights.”

In an interview with NBC ahead of the event, Trump also suggested that he would vote in favor of repealing Florida’s six-week abortion ban, which limits the procedure before many women even know they are pregnant.

Trump, in the interview, did not explicitly say how he plans to vote on the ballot measure this fall. But he repeated his past criticism that the measure, signed into law by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis last year, is too restrictive.

“I think the six weeks is too short. It has to be more time,” he said. “I am going to be voting that we need more than six weeks.”

Trump had previously called DeSantis’ decision to sign the bill a “terrible mistake.”

Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement after the rally Thursday that Trump “has not yet said how he will vote on the ballot initiative in Florida” known as Amendment 4 and that he “simply reiterated that he believes six weeks is too short.”

His comments nonetheless drew immediate reaction from those who oppose abortion rights, including Marjorie Dannenfelser, the President of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, who said she had spoken with Trump after his speech.

“He has not committed to how he will vote on Amendment 4. President Trump has consistently opposed abortions after five months of pregnancy. Amendment 4 would allow abortion past this point. Voting for Amendment 4 completely undermines his position,” she said, adding that, “anyone who believes in drawing a different line” still “must vote against Amendment 4, unless they don’t want a line at all.”

In his speech, Trump also said that, if he wins, families will be able to deduct expenses for caring for newborns from their taxes.

“We’re pro-family,” he said.

Trump has held multiple conflicting positions on abortion over the years. After briefly considering backing a potential 15-week ban on the procedure nationwide, he announced in April that regulating abortion should be left to the states.

In the months since, he has repeatedly taken credit for his role in overturning Roe and called it “a beautiful thing to watch” as states set their own restrictions.

Trump, however, has also said he does not support a national abortion ban, and over the weekend, his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vancesaid he would veto such legislation if it landed on his desk.

“Donald Trump’s view is that we want the individual states and their individual cultures and their unique political sensibilities to make these decisions because we don’t want to have a nonstop federal conflict over this issue,” Vance said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Trump first came out in favor of IVF in February after the Alabama state Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos can be considered children under state law, briefly pausing treatment and sparking national backlash.

Trump has since claimed the Republican party is a “leader” on the issue, even as at least 23 bills aiming to establish fetal personhood have been introduced in 13 states so far this legislative session, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. That kind of legislation, which asserts that life begins at conception, could imperil fertility treatments that involve the storage, transportation and destruction of embryos.

Senate Republicans in June blocked legislation that would have made it a right nationwide for women to access IVF and other reproductive technology, and also would have made treatments more accessible by requiring employer-sponsored insurance plans and other public insurance plans to cover fertility treatments.

IVF can costs tens of thousands of dollars for medical appointments, medication and surgery, and is not covered by many health insurance plans.

Trump has in general been opposed to various kinds of federal mandates, and originally ran against the Affordable Care Act — also known as Obamacare — which included popular provisions like protections for people with preexisting health conditions.

In a statement, Harris’ campaign said Trump shouldn’t be believed.

“Trump lies as much if not more than he breathes, but voters aren’t stupid,” said Harris-Walz 2024 spokesperson Sarafina Chitika. “Because Trump overturned Roe v. Wade, IVF is already under attack and women’s freedoms have been ripped away in states across the country. There is only one candidate in this race who trusts women and will protect our freedom to make our own health care decisions: Vice President Kamala Harris.”

Jessica Mackler, the President of EMILYs List, which works to elect women who support abortion rights, called Trump’s proposal “disingenuous and unserious.”

“He knows how unpopular the GOP’s attacks on fertility treatments are, and his comments are a desperate ploy to distract from the fact that he and his party have gutted reproductive freedom,” added Reproductive Freedom for All President and CEO Mini Timmaraju.

Trump made the IVF announcement during a campaign swing to Michigan and Wisconsin, states he is intensely focused on recapturing after he won them in 2016 but narrowly lost both states in 2020.

Trump’s first stop was Alro Steel in Potterville, Michigan, near the state capital of Lansing, where he railed against the Biden administration over inflation.

“Kamala has made middle class life unaffordable and unlivable and I’m going to make America affordable again,” he charged.

Later, Trump traveled to La Crosse, Wisconsin, for a town hall moderated by former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, a former Democrat who endorsed the GOP nominee earlier this week.

Gabbard opened the town hall by talking about her own IVF journey, giving herself injections in airport bathrooms and the heartbreak of failed embryo transfers. While the treatments ultimately didn’t work for her, she applauded Trump’s proposal.

“I can’t tell you how life-changing that would be for so many families,” she said.

It was his first visit to the state since the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, which ended just days before Biden dropped out of the race and began after Trump survived an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania.

Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, which Trump will visit again Friday, are part of the so-called “blue wall” bloc of northern industrial states that Democrats carried for two decades before Trump won them in 2016.

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Republished with permission of The Associated Press.

Associated Press


14 comments

  • Yrral

    August 30, 2024 at 9:34 am

    Why Trump support abortion,he probably paid for a few Google Trump Paid For Abortion Google Trump Marla Maples Abortion

    • Day 38

      August 30, 2024 at 9:59 am

      Where can I get a Yrral decoder book? 😜

      • rick whitaker

        August 30, 2024 at 7:35 pm

        PEACHY MARK, it’s called reading. i read yrral’s post and had no trouble. what’s wrong with you, if someone doesn’t punctuate properly you dump on them, shame on you. you are not a good person it seems, more of a bully type, it shows.

  • ScienceBLVR

    August 30, 2024 at 10:20 am

    Cue Queen…
    Oh Donny boy,
    All day long, all day long, all day long
    Liar, liar, they never ever let you win
    Liar, liar, everything you do is “spin”
    Liar, nobody believes you
    Liar, they bring you down before you begin
    Ooh, now let me tell you this
    So now you know you could
    Be done before they let you
    “Kamala’s gonna get you”
    Aah

  • Elmo

    August 30, 2024 at 10:40 am

    Forking Liar

    • Day 38

      August 30, 2024 at 11:29 am

      Yet it’s okay when “Fracking Kammy” or “Closed Border Kammy” lies?

      • Tom

        August 30, 2024 at 4:11 pm

        Day 38? She did a presser yesterday 🙂

        • Day 38

          August 30, 2024 at 4:24 pm

          Are you talking about the taped interview? If so, yes. I didn’t see it though.😀

          • rick whitaker

            August 30, 2024 at 8:21 pm

            PEACHY MARK, why didn’t you watch the harris press interview? you went on for days about harris not having a press release, and then you don’t watch it. that makes you look bad dude or duddette. you are just a hater, you don’t need a valid reason. what a loser.

  • PeterH

    August 30, 2024 at 11:30 am

    Here’s the bottom line ….. Trump will say anything and propose anything to stay out of prison. He’s very aware that Big Macs are not served in the penitentiary……. Additionally there are no tanning beds or orange hair dye.

  • Kathy

    August 30, 2024 at 5:18 pm

    Ha ha ha. Dementia Don knows he is a loser. He is now opposing his own Project 25. He forgot he is doing away with the popular Affordable care Act, forgot they oppose IVF and carry JD Sean iron containers to the rallies, and forgot he will be in prison not the White House.

  • cassandra was right

    August 30, 2024 at 6:12 pm

    Trump’s Project 2025 calls fertilized eggs “persons”, and Trump’s three hand-picked “pro-life” SCOTUS justices are expected to agree.

    Since the majority of successful IVF procedures require disposal of some number of fertilized eggs, those methods will be banned regardless of Trump’s lies (and ignorance of facts). With Trump’s high-failure IVF method the only procedure available to women, more families will be left disappointed.

    Trump’s Project 2025 is theocracy!
    Vote out the Christian Nationalist Republican Party!

  • Ocean Joe

    August 30, 2024 at 6:16 pm

    Trump is weathervaning because suburban women cost him the last election. That’s right, he knows he lost. Admitted it on August 23. But he’ll want another election denier assault on the Capitol anyway.

  • PeterH

    August 30, 2024 at 7:42 pm

    The fact remains….. Trump could care less about a winning message for women ….. or for that matter ….a winning message for America. Trump’s too little … too late imaginary change of heart on abortion is nothing more than a Hail Mary pass with the sole, desperate intent to keep him out of prison.

Comments are closed.


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