President Donald Trump has taken several actions via executive order and administrative directive to advance the prolife cause since taking office last week. His actions reverse several pro-abortion policies implemented by his predecessor, President Joe Biden.
The Trump administration’s moves on abortion policy coincided with last Friday’s March for Life, the annual gathering of pro-life activists in Washington, DC, where Trump delivered pre-recorded remarks via video message.
Here are three steps the Trump administration has taken to implement the objectives of the pro-life movement as the official policy of the United States government.
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1. Re-establishing the Mexico City Policy, committing to enforce the Hyde Amendment
In an executive order last Friday, Trump revoked the presidential memorandum issued on January 28 2021, that authorised taxpayer funding to abortion providers, including Planned Parenthood and Marie Stopes International, in addition to reinstating a directive from his first administration re-establishing the Mexico City Policy.
First adopted by President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, the Mexico City Policy prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars to fund organisations that promote or perform abortions overseas.
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Over the past four decades, Democrat presidents have consistently rescinded the policy, also known as the Global Protect Life Policy, after taking office, while Republicans have reinstated it after assuming the presidency. In a separate executive order issued Friday, Trump established the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars to fund abortions, as the official policy of the US government.
Trump’s executive order relating to the Hyde Amendment revokes two executive orders implemented by the Biden administration, which he condemned for “embedding forced taxpayer funding of elective abortions in a wide variety of Federal programmes.” The executive orders in question were designed to make it easier for women to access abortion as well as the abortion pills, known as mifepristone.
In a statement reacting to the executive orders, Erin Hawley of the religious liberty legal nonprofit Alliance Defending Freedom asserted: “We’re pleased to see the Trump administration take these crucial steps to redirect American taxpayer dollars to programmes that offer real health care for women and children instead of the scandal-ridden abortion industry.”
Hawley added: “Ensuring that taxpayer dollars don’t pay for abortions has saved lives, and it’s a policy that continues to receive bipartisan support from a majority of Americans. Government-compelled participation in abortion has no place in our country. American taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to fund abortions or to export and promote them abroad.”
Conversely, Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood, condemned the reinstatement of the Mexico City Policy, which she referred to as the “Global Gag Rule”. McGill Johnson derided the “dangerous” move in a statement published Friday, adding: “The global gag rule not only disrupts the delivery of health services in areas of the world that are most in need, it also rolls back progress in countries that have fought to advance access to health care and human rights.”
“Elected officials should not be interfering in personal medical decisions, in this country or anywhere in the world. We must reverse and end the global gag rule permanently, full stop.”
2. Rejoining the Geneva Consensus Declaration
In a diplomatic note submitted last Friday, the United States Mission to the United Nations announced that the US was rejoining the Geneva Consensus Declaration. While the US was one of the original cosponsors of the declaration, which asserted that “there is no international right to abortion”, the Biden administration withdrew the US from the Geneva Consensus Declaration upon taking office in 2021.
Other countries that have signed on to the Geneva Consensus Declaration, spearheaded by then-US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in 2020, include: Bahrain, Belarus, Benin, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, the Republic of the Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Egypt, Eswatini, Gambia, Georgia, Haiti, Hungary, Indonesia, Iraq, Kenya, Kuwait, Libya, Nauru, Niger, Oman, Pakistan, Paraguay, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, South Sudan, Sudan, Uganda, United Arab Emirates and Zambia.
“The United States is committed to promoting women’s health and meeting the needs of women, children and their families at all stages of life,” the diplomatic note stated. “The United States will pursue these objectives in cooperation with member states in the UN system and through our continued shared ambition for improved health for women and girls. Investing in women’s health and well-being saves lives, allows women and girls more opportunities and protects the family as the fundamental unit of society.”
In a statement, Susan B Anthony Pro-Life America president Marjorie Dannenfelser, expressed gratitude that “thanks to President Trump, we are standing with the international community for life again”. Dannenfelser added: “President Trump’s executive action reaffirms the commitment of nations to protect their most vulnerable citizens, including unborn children, while safeguarding sovereign countries against pressure from the United Nations and others to strip those protections away.”
3. Vowing to scale back enforcement of the FACE Act
In a memo published last Friday, the chief of staff to the US attorney general identified “prosecutions under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act” as “the prototypical example” of “the weaponisation of the federal government” that Trump promised to end if elected.
Enacted in 1993, the FACE Act subjects anyone who “by force or threat of force or by physical obstruction, intentionally injures, intimidates or interferes with or attempts to injure, intimidate or interfere” with the provision of reproductive health services to federal charges.
The Justice Department memo highlighted the concerns of pro-life activists that following the US Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision that determined the US Constitution does not contain a right to abortion, “nearly all the prosecutions under the FACE Act have been against pro-life protesters” despite the fact that pro-abortion protesters have targeted pro-life pregnancy centres with arson and vandalism in the past three years.
Stating that the lopsided prosecutions under the law do not reflect “the even-handed administration of justice”, the DOJ indicated that under Trump administration policy, “future abortion-related FACE Act prosecutions and civil actions will be permitted only in extraordinary circumstances, or in cases presenting significant aggravating factors, such as death, serious bodily harm, or serious property damage.”
The memo insisted that “Cases not presenting significant aggravating factors can adequately be addressed under state or local law,” suggesting that the DOJ would not prosecute nonviolent FACE Act violations.
The memo also declared that “until further notice, no new abortion-related FACE Act actions — criminal or civil — will be permitted without authorisation from the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division.” The announcement concluded by urging the Civil Rights Division to dismiss FACE Act charges against nearly two dozen pro-life activists. News of Trump’s pardoning of the 23 pro-life activists convicted of federal crimes for blocking entrances to abortion clinics before the overturning of Roe v. Wade broke a day before the memo’s publication. Some of those pardoned were serving prison sentences. “They should not have been prosecuted. Many of them are elderly people,” Trump said at the signing ceremony. “This is a great honour to sign this.”
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