Biden and Democrats Seize on Trump's Striking Interview

The Biden campaign is mounting a concerted push to attack former President Donald J. Trump over statements he made to Time magazine in a wide-ranging interview published Tuesday morning, particularly on abortion.

In the interview, Mr. Trump refused to commit to vetoing a national abortion ban and said he would allow states to monitor women's pregnancies and prosecute those who violated abortion restrictions.

"This is reprehensible," President Biden wrote on X. "Donald Trump doesn't trust women. I do."

Julie Chavez Rodriguez, Mr. Biden's campaign manager, said in a statement that Mr. Trump would "sign a national abortion ban, allow women who have an abortion to be prosecuted and punished, allow the government to invade women's privacy to monitor their pregnancies and put I.V.F. and contraception in jeopardy nationwide."

Abortion has become a winning issue for Democrats, and Mr. Biden has argued that Mr. Trump and Republicans will continue to erode abortion rights. He and Vice President Kamala Harris have campaigned heavily on the issue in battleground states, and Democrats hope that state ballot initiatives to protect abortion rights will help their candidates for president, Congress and state offices. Their messaging has sought to pin state abortion bans directly on Mr. Trump, whose appointees to the Supreme Court helped overturn Roe v. Wade.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, Democrat of California, posted screenshots of the interview on X, writing that Mr. Trump had said he would "let red states monitor women's pregnancies and prosecute those who violate abortion bans" and had hinted "at banning abortion pills."

"He'll see what women think about that this November," said Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, also a Democrat.

The former president also told Time that he would deploy the U.S. military to detain and deport migrants, and did not dismiss the possibility of political violence should he lose the election.

Democrats highlighted some of those statements as well.

"Donald Trump's repeated threats of political violence are as horrifying and dangerous as they are un-American," said Alex Floyd, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee. "Trump is hellbent on threatening our democracy, win or lose."

Hillary Clinton urged her followers on X to read about Mr. Trump's plans for a second term and "take them seriously."

Mr. Trump's interview — in which he faced detailed and probing questions about his policy positions — reveals the pitfalls for candidates when they sit down with mainstream news organizations. Mr. Trump does so rarely. But Mr. Biden has been even more averse to being questioned by journalists, a traditional undertaking of those running for the White House.

The president's two most recently released interviews have been on "The Howard Stern Show" and the comedy podcast "SmartLess."

Reid J. Epstein covers campaigns and elections from Washington. Before joining The Times in 2019, he worked at The Wall Street Journal, Politico, Newsday and The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. More about Reid J. Epstein