USA – RFK Jr. Is Coming for Abortion Pills

And he’s relying on bogus science to make his case.

Julianne McShane, Mother Jones
May 15, 2025

Earlier this month, the Trump administration scored seemingly positive headlines when it asked a federal court to dismiss a case brought by three Republican states seeking to restrict telehealth access to mifepristone, the first of two drugs used in a medication abortion.

Several news outlets claimed in headlines that the administration would “defend” access to the pills, despite the fact that Project 2025 and several of Trump’s top appointees have made it clear that they believe access to mifepristone—which, along with the second drug, misoprostol, now account for more than 60 percent of all abortions that occur nationwide—should be drastically rolled back, as I have previously reported. In reality, the administration merely argued the states do not have standing to sue and did not weigh in on the underlying issue of access to the pills.

Continued: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/05/rfk-jr-is-coming-for-abortion-pills/

RFK Jr orders mifepristone review as anti-abortion groups push for ban

Health secretary cites ‘new data’ that emerged from flawed study conservatives are using to pressure US government

Susan Rinkunas
Wed 14 May 2025

The US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, said on Wednesday that he had directed the FDA to review the regulations around the abortion pill mifepristone.

The review, he said, was necessary due to “new data” – data that emerged from a flawed analysis that top US anti-abortion groups are now using to pressure the Trump administration to reimpose restrictions on the abortion pill, if not pull it from the market entirely.

“It’s alarming,” Kennedy told the Missouri senator Josh Hawley, a Republican, during a congressional hearing. “Clearly, it indicates that, at very least, the label should be changed.”

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/14/rfk-jr-fda-abortion-pill-mifepristone

The GOP’s Resurgence Of Pro-Natalism Looks A Lot Like The Past

The Trump administration's policy ideas to incentivize women to have more kids resemble those pushed by authoritarian regimes throughout history.

By Alanna Vagianos
May 9, 2025

President Donald Trump is reportedly entertaining policy proposals to incentivize American women to have more children. But the proposals don’t include basic and undeniably effective ideas like subsidized child care or paid parental leave. Instead, the Trump administration appears to be considering a $5,000 cash “baby bonus” and a “National Medal of Motherhood” for any woman who has six or more children.
The policy proposals are part of a larger push from conservative Republicans to boost the United States’ declining birth rates by persuading families to have more kids. The proposals fall squarely into what’s known as the pro-natalist movement — an ideology created to raise declining population rates that has historically been co-opted by far-right misogynist groups, including fascist and authoritarian regimes.

Continued: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/gop-pro-natalism-fascism-eugenics_n_681bc59ee4b07abf7dea4fc8

Global voices on ending USAID, part 2

On 1 July 2025, USAID is officially to be dismantled. Since President Donald Trump froze the funds of the US development agency at the beginning of the year, we have been receiving messages from various parts of the world. The senders want to describe the situation in their countries, discuss the way forward – or simply express their shock. We want to offer the various voices a platform to summarise their thoughts in short statements. This is the second of two parts of their statements.

by D+C / E+Z
May 7, 2025

The end of USAID has had a profound impact on the reproductive health of women in Africa and Asia. In total, MSI Reproductive Choices has lost $ 14 million in funding because it refused to comply with the rules and regulations of the Trump administration. This funding must now be replaced by other funds, as must a further $ 6 million for services previously provided by UN organisations, state health systems and other organisations. One of the countries most affected by the cuts is Zimbabwe, where a combined $ 6.5 million in USAID funding has been cancelled. Only by filling these service gaps in a timely manner can a significant increase in unintended pregnancies, unsafe abortions, and pregnancy-related deaths be avoided.

Across Africa, where I lead MSI’s work expanding access to lifesaving sexual and reproductive healthcare, the USAID cuts led by the world’s richest man are devastating for women living in the poorest communities of the continent. Denied this lifeline, women will no longer be able to safely space their pregnancies, pushing them further into the cycle of poverty, while those in the most desperate circumstances will be left with no option but to risk their lives by resorting to unsafe abortion.

Continued: https://www.dandc.eu/en/article/president-donald-trump-froze-funds-us-development-agency-beginning-year-we-have-been-0

In Just 100 Days, Trump Has Already Achieved One-Third of Project 2025 Agenda

A new community-based tracker reveals how quickly the Trump administration is advancing policies that erode civil rights, healthcare access and worker protections.

4/28/2025
by Carrie N. Baker, Ms.Magazine

A new community-based resource, the Project 2025 Tracker is closely following the Trump administration’s work to accomplish the 312 objectives of Project 2025. As of Monday, April 28:

One-third of Project 2025’s objectives have been achieved (97 of 312).

One-fifth are in progress (62).

Work on just under half (153) has not yet started.

In Trump’s first 100 days in office, he has achieved over one-quarter of Project 2025 policy recommendations eroding reproductive health and rights and is working on another 17 percent of these objectives.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2025/04/28/trump-project-2025-plan-reproductive-rights-abortion-lgbtq-childcare-title-ix/

28.04.2025

USA – The Data We Don’t Collect Is Killing Women

Without a national system to track the consequences of abortion bans, preventable deaths are disappearing into the void—by design.

4/24/2025
by Sydney Saubestre

Since Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, at least 10 women have died as a direct result of their inability to access healthcare. But this number is only a guess, because there’s no single place that records and tracks these tragedies. And that’s not just an oversight—it’s a choice.

As a data expert who used to work with survivors of sexual violence, I have seen how failures to measure a problem make it easier for those in power to keep harming people without accountability. Data is power, and the legislators—mostly men—driving these decisions don’t want us to see the true impact. We owe it to the women and others affected to make that impact visible.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2025/04/24/data-abortion-ban-death-women-maternal-mortality-morbidity/

USA – Where the Conservative War on Abortion Pills Is Headed

By Andrea González-Ramírez, the Cut
March 12, 2025

In his nearly two months in office, President Donald Trump has only made small moves to advance his anti-abortion agenda. But his Justice Department’s decisions to enforce a law that protects abortion clinics from violence only in “extraordinary” cases and to stop defending a Biden-era lawsuit against Idaho that sought to protect access to emergency abortion care in hospitals send a clear signal: The federal government will not defend what curtailed abortion rights remain post-Dobbs. Now, Republican lawmakers emboldened by that message are going after their most urgent target: abortion pills.

Continued: https://www.thecut.com/article/republicans-unleash-new-attacks-on-abortion-pills.html

USA – The FACE Act was enacted to protect reproductive health clinics − here’s why its history matters today

March 10, 2025
Micki Burdick, Assistant Professor of Women & Gender Studies, University of Delaware

Soon after taking office for a second time, President Donald Trump pardoned anti-abortion activists who had blockaded and restricted access to the entrance of a reproductive health clinic in Washington, D.C., in October 2020.

These protesters were convicted of violating the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. Protesting outside clinics is a way for conservative anti-abortion activists to directly influence access to reproductive health care.

Continued: https://theconversation.com/the-face-act-was-enacted-to-protect-reproductive-health-clinics-heres-why-its-history-matters-today-249427

Amid Aid Cuts, a Renewed U.S. Policy Increases Health Risks for Women and Girls in Conflict Areas

While the Trump administration is gutting U.S. foreign aid across the board, programs aimed at women and girls’ sexual and reproductive health will be among those hardest hit. Crisis Group expert Cristal Downing describes why those living in conflict settings could pay the heaviest price.

Cristal Downing, Project Director, Gender and Conflict
March 3, 2025

Since taking office, President Donald Trump has implemented an unprecedented cutoff of U.S. foreign aid. On 20 January 2025, he froze international assistance for 90 days, claiming that this was so the federal government could review and ascertain whether U.S.-supported programs reflect U.S. interests and values. On 24 January, the State Department issued a “stop work” order, pausing all existing and new foreign aid. Secretary of State Marco Rubio initially provided for some exceptions to that order, including food assistance and military support for Egypt and Israel. On 29 January, he issued an additional waiver so that “life-saving humanitarian assistance” including medicine and other supplies would continue to flow, although it is unclear whether this has happened in practice. In early February, in an alleged effort to reduce federal spending, the administration subsumed the U.S. Agency for International Development into the State Department. Toward the end of the month, a flurry of contract cancellations and litigation added further to enormous global uncertainty about the future of U.S. foreign assistance – and led to disruptions in services ranging from famine relief to HIV treatment.

Continued: https://www.crisisgroup.org/global-united-states/amid-aid-cuts-renewed-us-policy-increases-health-risks-women-and-girls

Listen up, Trumpists – your idea of abortion’s history is all wrong

Mary Fissell’s fascinating book, Abortion: A History, whirls readers from Cicero’s Rome to 16th-century ‘witches’ to modern-day Ireland

Ella Whelan
01 March 2025

“A beautiful thing to watch”: that’s the phrase Donald Trump used to describe the slew of anti-abortion bills passed by American states in 2022, after “Roe v Wade”, a 50-year-old legal judgement in favour of abortion rights, was overturned by the US Supreme Court. While Trump’s personal views on abortion are unknown – over the decades, they’ve swayed with the breeze of whatever has made him popular – his recent words, not to mention the views of his vice-president JD Vance and their evangelical supporters, are the sort you hear described as “from the dark ages”. Abortion-rights activists, in fact, tend to make this kind of distinction: the “pro-choice” movement is progressive and future-oriented, and the “pro-life” (or “anti-choice”) crowd are stuck in the past.

But, according to a new book by the American historian Mary Fissell, the Trumpists’ view of abortion – “heartbeat bills”, no mercy for rape victims, a focus on the “unborn” – isn’t even an accurate representation of the past (whether that past is idolised or despised). In Abortion: A History, she charts a different timeline.

Continued: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/non-fiction/review-mary-fissell-abortion-history/