Former President Donald Trump dodged a question on whether he agreed with the Supreme Court’s decision to not block Texas’s restrictive abortion law — calling the move “complex” but “probably temporary.”
In a new TV interview, Trump was asked if his three nominees to the court made a difference when it came to the controversial law.
“Well, I will tell you this. We do have a Supreme Court that’s a lot different than it was before, it was acting very strangely. And I think, probably not in the interests of our country,” Trump told “Full Measure” host Sharyl Attkisson in an interview that will air in full next Sunday.
Trump nominated three justices to the Supreme Court — Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett — to establish a 6-3 conservative majority.
The Supreme Court did not act on an emergency request last week by pro-choice groups to block the law, which bans abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected at about six weeks and authorizes citizens to enforce the ban by allowing them to pursue legal action against doctors or anyone else involved in terminating a pregnancy.
Chief Justice John Roberts joined the court’s three liberal members in dissent.
Critics say the law runs afoul of the landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 that protects a woman’s right to an abortion.
“I know that the ruling was a very complex and also probably temporary,” Trump said in the interview. “I think other things will happen and that will be the big deal and the big picture. So we’ll see what would happen, but we’re studying the ruling and we’re studying also what, what they’ve done in Texas, but we have great confidence in the governor and the attorney general and the lieutenant governor.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said last week that she would bring legislation to codify Roe v. Wade in the House.
Also in the wide-ranging interview, excerpts of which were released late Saturday night, Trump warned the US about welcoming Afghan refugees who fled after Taliban fighters took control of Afghanistan.
“Do you think the Afghanistan war is over?” Attkisson asked.
“I don’t know because you have people going all over the world and being dropped all over the world right now. And nobody knows who the hell they are, Sharyl,” Trump said.
“These aren’t the interpreters that we took. These were people that rushed into the planes and they were so interested in trying to make it sound like, go, they’re doing a good job. These people, many of these people are going to be terrorists, OK? They’re going to be terrorists. They were very powerful. They were very energetic and getting onto the aircraft,” he said.
Attkisson chimed in saying the evacuees were supposed to have been vetted before boarding the planes.
Trump replied, “There is no documentation in that country — there’s virtually no documentation.”
