“Think about what some people have had to go through because of these laws. JD Vance calls pregnancies resulting from rape ‘inconvenient.’ Inconvenience is intercourse. I mean, it’s — let him go through it,” Beshear said. “It’s like someone being mistreated, someone being harmed and then being told they have no choice after that. That doesn’t pass any decency or humanity test. But that’s the point — it also shows they have no compassion at all. And a president and a vice president have to have compassion.”

Vance, who has family ties to Eastern Kentuckywas asked in 2021 whether victims of rape or incest should have access to abortion and said, “The issue is not whether a woman should be forced to carry a child to term, but whether a child should be allowed to live even if the circumstances of its birth are somehow unfavorable or pose a problem for society.”

Beshear has been campaigning for Vice President Kamala Harris since she announced her presidential bid earlier this year, including in other television interviews and on the campaign trail. Much of his speech Monday focused on reproductive rights, the a topic his 2023 re-election campaign in Kentucky.

Republicans interpreted the governor’s comments as a suggestion to rape a member of the Vance family. The senator asked, “What the hell is that?” along with a clip from the Beshear interview in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

“Why does @AndyBeshearKY want a member of my family to be raped?!?” Vance said. “What a disgusting person.”

One of the Trump campaign’s X-Accounts, @TrumpWarRoomshared a clip of Beshear saying the governor “wants a member of JD Vance’s family to become pregnant from rape.”

Andy Westberry, a spokesman for the Kentucky Republican Party, said in a statement that Beshear’s frequent references to the parable of the Good Samaritan “ring hollow when condoning vile attacks.”

“Rape is a heinous crime that no one – no one – should ever have to endure, including Senator Vance’s family,” Westberrry said. “Andy Beshear should be ashamed of himself for suggesting that any human being, let alone a political opponent, deserves such trauma. He must immediately retract this disgraceful remark and publicly apologize to the Vance family.”

Beshear and Vance recently had feuds in Media coverage And public appearances while Beshear was considered as a possible running mate for Harris. She ultimately chose Governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz before the DNC.

A person associated with Beshear’s PAC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.