With the 2016 presidential race heating up, the candidates are hitting the campaign trail and tackling the issues that the voters are wanting to hear about. 

One of those issues revolves around the recent Planned Parenthood controversies and and abortion in general. 

Republican candidate Donald Trump recently appeared in a national television interview where he said that the public's stance on abortion is in transition.  According to Trump, public support for abortion "is actually going down a little bit," polls show.

Our partners at PolitiFact Florida took a look at Trump's claim to see if it was accurate.

Politifact reporter Joshua Gillin says that the statement rates FALSE on the Truth-O-Meter.  Gillin says that Trump may have been misled by a narrow range of data.

"We took a look at these polls, and what they tell us is that, for the last twenty years or so, the percentages of the people who consider themselves pro-choice and pro-life have stayed pretty stable," said Gillin.  "In general, the numbers have been about 50 percent pro-choice to 41 percent pro-life.  The most recent numbers are slightly different, showing 50 to 44."

So what numbers was Trump looking at?  "During our research, we found that the pro-choice number dipped slightly in 2009," said Gillin.  "Did it go down?  Technically, yes, but you're talking about an extremely short span of time.  When you chart out the numbers over twenty years, you'll see that those lines for support on both sides of the argument remain pretty constant, and there's no indication that the pro-choice numbers are trending down."

Because the data has been consistent for both viewpoints, PolitiFact rates Donald Trump's claim FALSE on the Truth-O-Meter.

 

SOURCES: Abortion support declining?