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Schumer wants a clear answer from the candidate on Roe v. Wade.

Senator Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader, said in an interview that he would urge Democrats to ask the candidate if he or she would vote to overthrow Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling legalizing abortion.

"I think people should ask," Schumer said. "And I think the American people should expect a direct answer."

In the past, senators have often asked questions about Roe by asking candidates if they accept the decision as "established law" and they respect the legal precedent. But Schumer said Trump overturned the old rules by openly declaring that he would only choose candidates who would overthrow Roe, and publish a list of potential candidates.

And he noted that past candidates who said that they respect precedent – including Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, appointed to court last year by Mr. Trump, who said that He would "follow the law of the judicial precedent" – voted to overturn past decisions, most recently last month in a case that diluted the power of the unions.

"No one believes that candidates for a preordained list will simply follow the existing law," Schumer said. "It has become a dodge.It has become a bar so low that it makes no sense, since the candidates made earlier promises and came back on them."

Of course, nothing prevents the candidate from delivering the traditional dodge: "With all due respect I can not answer a hypothetical question."

– Sheryl Gay Stolberg on the hill of Capitol