Trump says doctors 'rip the baby out of the womb' in late-term abortions

Donald Trump said that doctors can "rip the baby out of the womb" just prior to birth when asked about late-term abortions during the third presidential debate. There is little information to support his claims.

Clinton shot back saying that he couldn't be more wrong. "That is not what happens in these cases," she said.

Abortion has been a long-standing issue fought against by Republicans since the famous Roe v. Wade case in 1973 regulated abortion and gave women the right to choose to have one.

Clinton said that she will stand up for the right of women to have the choice and doesn't think that the government should be "stepping in and making those most personal of decisions".

"I have met women who toward the end of their pregnancy, get the worst news one could get," she said. "That their health is in jeopardy if they continue to carry to term or that something terrible has happened or just been discovered about the pregnancy."

Clinton has made similar statements before, arguing that late-term abortions "are because of medical necessity".

In the US 1.2% of all abortions take place after 20 weeks of pregnancy, about five months, according to research from the Guttmacher Institute's sexual health researchers. "Late-term" is often defined as coming any time after that.

There is little data to support either Trump or Clinton's claims. One study that looked at why women seek late-term abortions found them to be "younger women, those with limited financial resources and those who experienced logistical delays such as the need for extended travel to an abortion provider," according to FactCheck.org.

"There aren't good data on how often later abortions are for medical reasons," a reproductive health researcher told the fact-checking organization.

That also means there is little to support what Trump said either. "If you go with what Hillary is saying, in the ninth month you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother just prior to the birth of the baby," he said, even "on the final day" before birth.

Clinton responded that "using that kind of scare rhetoric is just terribly unfortunate".