GOP senator pushes back on Lindsey Graham's proposed federal abortion ban: "We should allow the states to explore the different possibilities'
- GOP Sen. Mike Rounds doesn't support Lindsey Graham's 15-week abortion ban.
- "I think right now we should allow the states to explore the different possibilities," Rounds said.
GOP Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota doesn't support his colleague Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham's proposed national ban on abortion after 15 weeks — adding mounting Republican opposition to the measure.
"No, I think right now we should allow the states to explore the different possibilities about the appropriate way to handle this," Rounds said while appearing on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday. "Here in South Dakota, we have one that I actually signed into law when I was governor back in...2006."
Rounds said the states "will come up with a whole lot of different ideas on how to appropriately discuss abortion in general" and will, eventually, "come to a consensus about the issue."
"But at this point, to have Congress step in and tell all the states that we know better than them how to handle this is not the right direction to go," Rounds told CNN's Jake Tapper.
Over a dozen Republican-controlled states, including South Dakota, have enacted near-total abortion bans since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in late June. The Court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health ended nearly 50 years of federal protections for first-trimester abortions and sent the issue back to the states.
But some, like Graham, want to go further. Graham's bill would prohibit abortion procedures nationwide after 15 weeks, with exceptions for rape, incest, and to save the life of the mother.
Rounds and 44 of his Republican colleagues previously supported and cosponsored a previous iteration of Graham's bill, introduced in January 2021 before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, that would have banned abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy.
But several Senate Republicans were caught off guard by Graham introducing a 15-week abortion ban just weeks before the 2022 midterms. Republicans, amid the mounting electoral backlash to overturning Roe, have largely sought to shift the focus back to the Biden administration's policies on immigration and the economy.
Graham defended his bill against charges it "handed the left a box of grenades" while appearing on Fox News Sunday.
"I'm pro-life even in an election year," Graham told Fox News' Shannon Bream. "And to those who suggest that being pro-life is losing politics, I reject that."