Sanders interviewed on CBS
Governor talks abortion, ’24 election on ‘Face the Nation’
In a 10-minute interview Sunday morning on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders addressed questions about abortion rights, the 2024 presidential election and whether she’s open to being Donald Trump’s vice president, to which she didn’t give a definitive answer.
“Face the Nation” moderator Margaret Brennan started the interview by pressing Sanders three times about whether she was open to a ballot initiative addressing abortion rights in the state.
Twice in the last three months, Attorney General Tim Griffin has rejected the Arkansans for Limited Government committee’s proposed ballot language for a constitutional amendment that would overhaul the state’s restrictive abortion law.
Arkansas’ current law bans abortions except to save the mother’s life and in medical emergencies, and has no exceptions for rape or incest.
Under the second version of the proposed amendment, the government of the state of Arkansas, its officers or its political subdivisions would “not prohibit, penalize, delay or restrict abortion services within 18 weeks of fertilization.”
After Brennan’s second attempt, Sanders said she was “proud of that fact” that “Arkansas’ overwhelmingly a pro-life state.”
“I’m proud of where we are and we continue to push for things that I think protect all innocent human life. It’s why we haven’t just focused on pro-life legislation. But we’ve also done things in the foster and adoption care space. It’s why I’ve spent so much time focusing on education and empowering every single Arkansan to have a great quality of life. We are looking at every aspect and making sure that we’re doing what we can to protect and value life at every stage here in the state of Arkansas.”
On the third try, Brennan said “It sounds like no, you wouldn’t want to put it on the ballot.”
“I’m not going to put a blanket on anything that could come forward,” Sanders responded. “But as it stands right now, I haven’t seen anything that I would be supportive of.”
Brennan then addressed maternal mortality rates, saying the Center for Disease Control reported Arkansas had one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the country until 2021.
According to a December 2022 legislative report from the Arkansas Maternal Mortality Review Committee, from 2018 to 2019 Arkansas had 54 pregnancy-associated deaths, with a pregnancy-associated mortality ratio of 73.7 deaths per 100,000 births.
For all pregnancy-associated deaths, Black mothers were approximately twice as likely to die compared to white mothers in Arkansas.
In April 2023, Sanders signed into law a bill extending paid maternity leave for state employees from four to 12 weeks.
“Arkansas is one of the few states that hasn’t extended postpartum care for mothers,” Brennan said. “Why don’t you want those moms to get care for a full 12 months as is being offered instead of just 60 days?”
Sanders said she had to “disagree with the premise of your question saying that I don’t want that.
“I certainly want us to do everything that we can to help during pregnancy and well after a child is born, which is why we have done things like focus on the foster and adoption care. We’ve put significant funding into our pregnancy crisis centers. We’re focusing on things that help our mothers including bring your kids to work at state government, we’ve expanded maternity leave for state employees.”
But Brennan pressed again, asking why Arkansas “opted out” of extending postpartum care to 12 months, like fellow Republican states such as Mississippi, Wyoming, Montana and South Dakota.
“We’re going to continue to look at options that we feel like best help people here in the state of Arkansas,” Sanders said. “We’ve done that in a number of ways, and we’re going to continue to do that over the course of hopefully the next seven years while I’m governor of Arkansas.”
Sanders was then asked why she wasn’t among 15 Republican governors that rejected a new federally funded program to give food assistance to hungry children during the summer months, denying benefits to 8 million children across the country.
Last year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture released a report that said Arkansas ranked as the worst state in the country when it comes to food insecurity, with 16.6% of Arkansas households experiencing food insecurity in 2022.
“Arkansas in the past has ranked at the bottom when it comes to food insecurity for children,” Sanders said. “I don’t think any child should ever go hungry. If we have options available to us to help improve that, that’s exactly what we’re gonna do. That’s why we’ve opted into this program. We’re going to continue to look for ways to help and protect kids in our state.”
Addressing the 2024 presidential election, Brennan asked Sanders what is said about the Republican Party and politics in general that the two leading candidates, President Joe Biden and former President Trump, were of an “advanced age,” with Biden being 81 and Trump, 77.
Sanders, one of four people who served as Trump’s press secretary during his White House tenure, said the “election right now is very simple” with a “clear contrast.”
“One has a record of success coming from a posture in a position of strength in Donald Trump and one becomes from a position of weakness,” Sanders claimed. “Every single thing that voters actually care about, every single thing that drives voters to show up and cast their ballot Donald Trump is winning on whether it’s the economy, whether it’s securing the border, whether it’s national security, whether it’s taking a hard line against China, every single one of those major issues that really drive voters.”
Brennan presented Sanders with a tweet from her predecessor, Asa Hutchinson, endorsing Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley after he dropped out of the presidential race last week.
“Anyone who believes Donald Trump will unite this country has been asleep over the last 8 years,” the post said. “Trump intentionally tries to divide America and will continue to do so. Go @NikkiHaley in New Hampshire.”
Brennan asked Sanders, “Do you honestly believe Trump is going to unite the country this time? When in the first term that you were part of the country was very divided?”
“One of the things that I think is so often left out of Donald Trump’s story is the patriotism and the love of country that he brought back,” Sanders said. “We see people who believe in America again, who’ve seen the strength of our country. We brought back American manufacturing. We secured our border we had a strong economy. Our enemies abroad actually feared us and our allies actually respected us, instead of the people now are across the other the other side of the world are laughing at us and taking advantage of the weakness of [Biden].”
She went on to proclaim “I know that [Trump] can deliver again, because he’s done it before.”
“You’d be open to vetting to be his vice president potentially?” Brennan asked.
Sanders didn’t give an explicit yes or no answer.
“I absolutely love the job I have,” Sanders said. “I think it’s one of the best jobs I could ever ask for and I am honored to serve as governor and I hope I get to do it for the next seven years.”