WASHINGTON — Mayor Giuliani’s presidential bid has become a tale of two campaigns. One track focuses on the issues he wants to discuss — fiscal conservatism and the war on terror, chiefly — while the other deals with the issues that he would rather avoid: abortion, gun control, and gay rights. Yesterday, the talk was abortion.

Following the disclosure that Mr. Giuliani personally donated money to a leading abortion rights group, the former mayor gave his most expansive explanation yet of his position on abortion.

While reiterating his personal opposition to the practice, he couched it as a matter of personal liberty and said he thought a “majority of Americans” share his opinion.

“I think life is enormously important. So is personal liberty,” Mr. Giuliani said, casting his position in a light that might, he may hope, appeal to champions of smaller government. He made the comments on “The Laura Ingraham Show,” on which he appeared following a report by Politico.com that he and his former wife, Donna Hanover, had made at least six donations to Planned Parenthood, a leading abortion rights group and provider. The donations total $900 and were made during the 1990s, when he was mayor of New York.

“Planned Parenthood makes information available. It’s consistent with my position,” Mr. Giuliani said. He said he also thinks women seeking abortions should be given information on adoption and that they should have a “real choice.”

Ms. Ingraham, a conservative political commentator, asked Mr. Giuliani whether he supported a requirement that women view an ultrasound image of their fetus before getting an abortion. Lawmakers in South Carolina, a key early primary state, had proposed the measure, although it was dropped from a bill last month. Mr. Giuliani again made a distinction between his personal preference and a policy position.

“I think it’d be a good idea,” he said. “Whether it were mandated I don’t know that I’d agree with that.”

The abortion question has dogged Mr. Giuliani throughout his campaign, and particularly in last week’s Republican presidential debate. He was pressed about his position repeatedly, and at one point was the only candidate of 10 on stage who did not say he believed that it would be good for America if the Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision. He said it would be “okay” either way.

Given the chance to elaborate yesterday, he said he could envision the two newest members of the court, Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito, voting either to reverse the decision on the grounds that it was wrongly decided or uphold it as a precedent and established law.

He rejected the notion that his position was a contradiction. “For some people it is inconsistent, but for me it’s my position, and I believe it strongly,” he said. “And I believe a lot of people come to the conclusion I come to.”

Mr. Giuliani has also cited his record in New York, saying that abortions dropped and adoptions increased during his tenure. His critics, along with the Web site factcheck.org, have said he is exaggerating that data and his role in causing the number of abortions to drop. Public records show that abortions in New York also dropped in the first three years under Mayor Bloomberg, who is much more emphatic in his support of abortion rights than Mr. Giuliani.

And in the days since the debate, his competitors have begun to wonder aloud what many pundits have said for some time — that his position on abortion, more than any other issue, could stand in the way of his winning the Republican nomination.

Senator McCain of Arizona told the Associated Press this week that it would be “tough” for an abortion rights supporter to be victorious in the Republican primaries. “I think it’s one of the fundamental principles of a conservative to have respect and commitment to the dignity of human life, both the born and unborn,” Mr. McCain said.

A long-shot candidate, Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado, was more blunt yesterday. In a statement issued by his campaign, he said that even if a “pro-choice” candidate could win the nomination, he or she should not. “Emphatically no,” he said. “If a Republican President of the United States won’t vigorously fight to protect the life of the unborn, how long before the trend toward the culture of death becomes irreversible?”

What is clear is that Mr. Giuliani wants to talk about something else. In a well-received speech to the conservative Heritage Foundation here on Monday night, he did not talk about social issues at all, sticking to his campaign themes of economic and national security. And when Ms. Ingraham asked him to return for another interview, Mr. Giuliani pleaded for her to ask him about those issues, which he said is what “most citizens ask” about on the campaign trail.

Ms. Ingraham, who had also asked him about guns, immigration, and briefly about taxes, made no guarantees. “Conservatives are citizens, too, Mayor Giuliani,” she responded. “We’re citizens, too.”