Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) called former President Donald Trump’s latest, vague campaign promise — that in vitro fertilization services will be paid for by the government or insurance companies under a second Trump presidency — “smoke and mirrors” on Friday, slamming him for the meaningless promise that she says distracts from the real threat: the possible criminalization of IVF treatments.
“Making vague promises about insurance coverage does not stop a single extremist judge or state legislature from banning IVF,” Warren said during a Friday morning press call hosted by Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign. “Making vague promises about insurance coverage does not stop a single one of the 131 Republicans in Congress from advancing their fetal personhood bill that would ban IVF.”
“Despite what Trump seems to think, American women are smart, and we aren’t falling for his gaslighting,” Warren added. “We know who Donald Trump is. We know the damage he has done, and we know the additional restrictions to access to IVF that lie ahead if Trump conceives the White House.”
Warren’s criticism came in response to an interview the former president gave Thursday in the battleground state of Michigan.
“We are going to be, under the Trump administration, we are going to be paying for that treatment,” Trump told NBC News before adding, “We’re going to be mandating that the insurance company pay.”
Asked to clarify whether the government or insurance companies would pay for IVF services, Trump reiterated that an option would be to have insurance companies pay for the fertility treatment “under a mandate, yes.”
Republicans have come under fire on IVF ever since the Alabama Supreme Court found that embryos can be afforded the same legal protections as children under the Wrongful Death of Minor Act of 1872, halting access to IVF treatments in the state for two weeks.
The decision was so crippling to those trying to start families that state legislators had to step in, passing a law that provided civil and criminal immunity to IVF providers — a solution that experts described as slapping a band-aid on the possible legal consequences of the ruling.
In June, in an effort to protect and expand nationwide access to IVF and quell concerns in red states about losing access to the fertility treatment, Senate Democrats forced a vote on the Right to IVF Act but Senate Republicans blocked it from moving forward to a vote.
“American women are not stupid, and we know the only guaranteed protection for IVF is a new national law, which Kamala Harris supports and Donald Trump opposes,” Warren said.
“Trump’s record on IVF is clear. Check out the facts,” she later added. “Trump’s own platform effectively bans IVF. The Republican Speaker of the House and a majority of House Republicans have signed on to a federal bill to ban IVF nationwide. When a law to protect IVF nationwide was put up for a vote in the Senate, JD Vance voted against it. And four weeks later, Trump picked Vance to be his running mate.”
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