Vice President Harris on Tuesday said decisions on gender-affirming care should be left to doctors and their patients in an interview with NBC News.
The vice president said “we should follow the law” when NBC’s Hallie Jackson pressed her on whether she believes in access to gender-affirming care.
Harris noted that former President Trump’s campaign has spent money on advertising that says Harris supports taxpayer-funded gender-affirmation surgeries.
“They’re trying to define you on this,” Jackson said, giving the vice president an opportunity to respond.
“I believe that people, as the law states, even on this issue about federal law, that that is a decision that doctors will make in terms of what is medically necessary. I’m not going to put myself in a position of a doctor,” Harris said.
The vice president argued that Trump’s ads are intended to distract Americans from his health care plan, including that Republicans have long intended to end the Affordable Care Act.
“Let’s also understand that Donald Trump is running tens of millions of dollars in ads to talk about two cases to distract from the fact that his policy and plan is also to take away the Affordable Care Act, which provides health care for tens of millions of people in our country,” she said. “Let’s not get distracted by the issues.”
Jackson pressed Harris for her message to LGBTQ Americans looking for a “full-throated backing” for the transgender community.
“I believe that all people should be treated with dignity and respect, period, and should not be vilified for who they are, and should not be bullied for who they are. And that is a true statement for me my entire career. And that has not changed,” she said.
Harris was also pressed on the issue of gender-affirming care in an interview with Fox News’s Bret Baier last week, during which Fox played the Trump campaign ad arguing Harris backs taxpayer-funded surgeries.
“I will follow the law, and it’s a law that Donald Trump actually followed,” she said at the time, referring to a New York Times report that people in the federal prison system were provided gender-affirming care under the Trump administration.
“I think, frankly, that ad from the Trump campaign is a little bit of throwing stones when you’re living in a glass house,” she added. “You have to take responsibility for what happened in your administration.”