Hillary Clinton made a powerful statement about women's right to choose at third debate

Impact

Hillary Rodham Clinton's performance at the final presidential debate — specifically her fervent and unbreakable defense of reproductive rights — shows just how imperative it is for women to be involved in politics.

Clinton made one of the most compelling cases for a woman's right to choose ever made by a presidential candidate. She vowed to relentlessly defend the Supreme Court's decision on women's reproductive rights.

"I strongly support Roe v. Wade, which guarantees a constitutional right to a woman to make the most intimate, most difficult, in many cases, decisions about her health care that one can imagine," Clinton said on Wednesday at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. "I will defend Planned Parenthood. I will defend Roe v. Wade and I will defend women's rights to make their own health care decisions."

Andrew Harnik/AP

When asked if he would overturn Roe v. Wade, the Republican nominee Donald Trump said he would pick pro-life Supreme Court justices who would "automatically" overturn the court's 1973 decision and leave it up to the individual states. He never explicitly said he would favor "overturning" Roe v. Wade.

Moderator Chris Wallace asked if Clinton would propose any limits to abortions, while also alluding to Trump's previous statements proposing women who obtain late-term abortions receive punishment. The former secretary of state stood her ground in the name of individual liberty.

"I do not think the United States government should be stepping in and making those most personal of decisions, so you can regulate if you are doing so with the life and the health of the mother taken into account," Clinton said after emphasizing the painful and heartbreaking circumstances that families endure when making tough decisions at the end of a woman's pregnancy.

Trump, who was working on his real estate career and starring in Celebrity Apprentice while Clinton was gaining more and more political experience, relied on "scare rhetoric" to counter Clinton's defense for late-term abortions.

"I think it's terrible 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," Trump said.

Clinton fired back at Trump's claims.

"That is not what happens in these cases and using that kind of scare rhetoric is just terribly unfortunate," Clinton said.

And again, unlike the GOP nominee, Clinton said she has witnessed the destruction the government can do to women by regulating what they can do with their body. 

"I've been to countries where governments forced women to have abortions like they did in China or force women to bear children like they used to do in Romania," Clinton said. "I can tell you the government has no business in the decisions that women make with their families in accordance with their faith, with medical advice, and I will stand up for that right."