- Jared Kushner has identified himself as being "pro-life" on the issue of abortion.
- He said he thought the Supreme Court correctly decided Roe v. Wade.
Jared Kushner has publicly come out as "pro-life" on the issue of abortion and said he believes the Supreme Court ruled correctly when it overturned Roe v. Wade.
The comments appear to be the first time that Kushner, a former senior White House advisor who is former President Donald Trump's son-in-law, declared his anti-abortion stance. In an interview with RealClearPolitics published ahead of the 2020 election, his wife, Ivanka Trump said, "I am pro-life, and unapologetically so."
Kushner made his comments on abortion in an interview with United Kingdom-based Sky News. Host Kay Burley asked Kushner, who is Jewish, how the Supreme Court's ruling squared with his faith.
"I'm pro-life and I think it was a properly-decided decision," Kushner said, adding: "If there is a robust debate about it, people could get angry and try to scream at each other or if there's a legislative compromise that should be reached then I think the legislators should do what they should have been doing for the last 50 years — not relying on a court decision — and come up with a position that hopefully is representative of what the American population wants."
Then-President Trump nominated three Supreme Court justices when he was in office, solidifying a 6-3 conservative majority. The court in June overturned Roe in its Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision, leaving the legalization of abortion up to the states.
In the wake of the decision, some Republican-led states have outlawed abortion while Democratic-led states have moved to expand abortion rights and shed restrictions. Democrats in Congress support a national law on abortion rights, while Republicans haven't unified behind national limits on abortion.
Donald Trump's position on abortion changed over the years. In the 1990s, he called himself "very pro-choice" but during the 2016 election he made a slew of anti-abortion campaign promises. He delivered to abortion foes on the issue when he was president, and anti-abortion leaders often call him "the most pro-life president in history."
The former president in June hailed the Supreme Court's ruling in Dobbs as "a victory for the Constitution, a victory for the rule of law, and above all, a victory for life."
During the early months of Trump's presidency, abortion rights organizations had staked some hope in Ivanka Trump tempering her father's stance on the issue.
But Kushner and Ivanka Trump reportedly met with Planned Parenthood in 2018 and offered to increase funding for the reproductive health organization if it stopped providing abortions, according to a memoir from Cecile Richards, the former president of Planned Parenthood.
Ivanka Trump wouldn't open up about her stance on abortion until far later in her father's presidency.
"I respect all sides of a very personal and sensitive discussion," Ivanka Trump said, "but I am also a mother of three children, and parenthood affected me in a profound way in terms of how I think about these things."