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global gag rule
Experts Warn of 'Devastating Damage' From Trump Reinstating Global Gag Rule
"People worldwide will have fewer points of service," said Doctors Without Borders. "It means fewer safe places to talk about their health options, and fewer providers to go to for help during medical emergencies."
Jan 27, 2025
Reproductive rights and medical experts on Monday continued to warn that U.S. President Donald Trump's highly anticipated reinstatement of the Mexico City Policy, which bans nongovernmental organizations that perform or promote abortion from receiving federal funding, will cause "devastating damage" for people around the world.
The global gag rule (GGR), as it is called by critics, has been imposed by every Republican president for decades, including Trump during his first term. After returning to office a week ago, Trump on Friday signed an executive order "to end the use of federal taxpayer dollars to fund or promote elective abortion" and revived the controversial rule with a presidential memorandum.
"As the single largest funder of international aid, the U.S. plays a powerful role in shaping the global health landscape—and women's and girls' lives are being used as pawns in this political game," Dr. Carole Sekimpi wrote Monday for the British journal The BMJ. "My work overseeing reproductive health programs in Africa for MSI Reproductive Choices gives me an understanding of the profound consequences that this will have on communities that Trump will never set foot in."
"It's prudent to first understand that the U.S. government never funds abortions," Sekimpi stressed, noting the rule punishes groups that participate in anything abortion-related with separate funding. "Last time Trump was in power, MSI was among those that refused to accept the terms of this policy. The U.S. funding we lost would have allowed us to serve 8 million women, preventing 6 million unintended pregnancies, 1.8 million unsafe abortions, and 20,000 maternal deaths. And that was just one organization."
Ibis Reproductive Health president Kelly Blanchard and Evelyne Opondo, an Ibis board member and the International Center for Research on Women's Africa director, also emphasized in a Monday Medium post that the rule's impact "is felt keenly by organizations that provide comprehensive sexual and reproductive healthcare—including contraception and abortion care—around the world," such as MSI and International Planned Parenthood Federation, "who refuse to abide by the terms because they support the human rights of all people and will not withhold information or critical reproductive healthcare from individuals who need it."
"The GGR flies in the face of both human rights and evidence-based public health," the pair asserted. "The GGR does not prevent abortion from happening but rather increases barriers to abortion access, reduces access to contraception increasing risk of unintended pregnancy, and could actually increase unsafe abortion, a key driver of maternal deaths around the world."
Melanie Nezer, vice president for advocacy and external relations at the Women's Refugee Commission, similarly declared in a Monday statement denouncing the GGR, "Let us be clear: this policy will not protect lives—it will endanger them."
"The goal of the global gag rule is to curtail access to safe sexual and reproductive healthcare, including access to safe abortion," she said. "The result is more suffering from the consequences of conflict-related sexual violence, more unintended pregnancies, more unsafe abortions, and more maternal death that would otherwise be entirely preventable."
Reproductive rights groups worldwide were similarly critical of the decision on Friday and throughout the weekend, with Planned Parenthood Federation of America president and CEO Alexis McGill Johnson calling it "dangerous" and arguing that "elected officials should not be interfering in personal medical decisions, in this country or anywhere in the world."
Like the critics on Monday, Rachana Desai Martin, chief government and external relations officer at the Center for Reproductive Rights, pointed to the fallout from GGR during the Republican's first term and said that "the reinstatement and expansion of President Trump's global gag rule is a direct assault on the health and human rights of millions of people around the world."
Also recalling the first Trump administration, Guttmacher Institute acting co-CEO Destiny Lopez highlighted how her group's "research has documented its severe ripple effects, including stalling and even reversing progress in expanding access to modern contraception in countries like Ethiopia and Uganda."
"Now history will sadly and shamefully repeat itself, and people in many countries will find it harder to access safe abortion, contraception, and other critical health services," she said, vowing to track the impacts and work to repeal the harmful policy.
Reproductive Freedom for All president and CEO Mini Timmaraju also pledged to battle the GGR and other Republican attacks on choice, saying that "these policies inflict harm on those who need access to reproductive healthcare, including abortion, in our country, and around the world—and we will fight back."
Previewing the fight ahead, National Abortion Federation president and CEO Brittany Fonteno warned that the GGR "will not be the last" attack on reproductive healthcare, adding that "for nearly a decade now, Donald Trump has shown us just how dangerous he is for abortion access, and it is clear that over the next four years, the anti-abortion movement will take every opportunity to strip away our fundamental right to reproductive freedom—both here and abroad."
RealClearPolitics, the first to report the rule's revival, noted that "the president timed the release of his executive actions to coincide with the annual March for Life on Friday when some of his most ardent supporters rallied on the National Mall. Vice President JD Vance addressed the march in person, while Trump recorded a video message Thursday to be played at the Friday rally."
Although Trump said on the campaign trail that he thinks abortion policies should be decided at the state level, rights advocates have cited his extensive record of dishonesty and bragging about the role he played in overturningRoe v. Wade, and expressed fear that the Republican-controlled Congress will send a national abortion ban to his desk.
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Bracing for New Trump Attacks, Georgia Abortion Defenders Vow to Fight On
"We cannot quit. We cannot be silent. If we quit, we lose more women," said one mother whose daughter died after being denied care under Georgia's six-week ban.
Jan 21, 2025
Congresswoman Nikema Williams joined patients, healthcare providers, and activists—including the mother of a woman who died after being refused abortion care in Georgia—at a Tuesday press conference held a day before what would have been the 52nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, and amid fears of a national abortion ban during U.S. President Donald Trump's second term.
"I refuse to stand by while extremist politicians attack our freedoms, our health, and our future," Williams (D-Ga.) told attendees of the virtual press conference, which was hosted by the abortion rights group Free & Just. "Reproductive freedom is about healthcare, it's about dignity, it's about autonomy. It's about ensuring that everyone, every person, has the ability to make the best decisions for themselves and their families without government interference."
Speakers at Tuesday's event included Shanette Williams, whose 28-year-old daughter Amber Nicole Thurman died in 2022 after being forced to travel out of state to seek care due to a recently passed Georgia law banning almost all abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, a period during which many people don't even know they're pregnant.
"I want to send a clear message to men to get off the sidelines and enter the fight for reproductive justice."
Thurman, who was the single mother of a young son, is one of at least several U.S. women—most of them Black or brown—whose deaths have been attributed to draconian anti-abortion laws.
"She left a son, who every day is confused by why his mother is not here," Williams said of her daughter. "I'm here to be that voice, to fight, to push, to do whatever I need to do to help save another life. Because I never want a mother to feel what I feel today."
"We cannot quit. We cannot be silent. If we quit, we lose more women," Williams added. "In November, following reporting from ProPublica, officials in Georgia dismissed all members of the state's Maternal Mortality Review Committee, which investigates the deaths of pregnant women across the state."
Last September, Fulton County Judge Robert McBurney struck down the state's six-week abortion ban as a violation of "a woman's right to control what happens to and within her body," a decision that made the procedure legal up to approximately 22 weeks of pregnancy. Republican Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr appealed the ruling to the state Supreme Court.
Avery Davis Bell, a Savannah mother who had to travel out of Georgia for care after her fetus was diagnosed with a fatal condition that threatened her own life as well, said during Tuesday's press conference: "I could have been Amber Nicole Thurman. It is important for me to continue sharing my story and advocating for us to be able to build the families we want, protect our lives, and be here for our living children."
Atlanta-area ultrasound technician and abortion care provider Suki O. said during the event that Georgia's ban "has been in place for three years now and it doesn't get any easier."
"To turn women away is the hardest thing for me to do," she added. "How many Black women will die, have died, and will continue to die due to these abortion bans?"
Davan'te Jennings, president of Young Democrats of Georgia and youth organizing director at Men4Choice, told the press conference that abortion "is not just a women's issue, this is a man's issue as well."
"I want to send a clear message to men to get off the sidelines and enter the fight for reproductive justice," Jennings added. "What would it look like for you to have to watch your mother go through this? To watch your sister go through this?"
While Trump has said he would veto any national abortion ban passed by the Republican-controlled Congress, reproductive rights advocates have expressed doubt that the president—a well-documented liar—would actually do so, and warned that his administration could use a 151-year-old law known as the Comstock Act to outlaw the procedure without needing congressional approval.
Critics also note that Trump has repeatedly bragged about appointing three of the U.S. Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the 2022 decision that canceled nearly a half-century of federal abortion rights.
The Trump administration is also widely expected to revive the so-called Global Gag Rule, which bans foreign nongovernmental organizations from performing or promoting abortion care using funds from any source, if they receive funds from the U.S. government for family planning activities.
Conservative groups, including the Heritage Foundation-led coalition behind Project 2025—a blueprint for a far-right overhaul of the federal government—have proposed policies includinga national abortion ban, restricting access to birth control, defunding Planned Parenthood, monitoring and tracking pregnancy and abortion data, and eviscerating federal protections for lifesaving emergency abortion care.
While campaigning for president, Trump said he would allow states to monitor women's pregnancies and prosecute anyone who violates an abortion ban. According to the Guttmacher Institute, 12 states currently have near-total abortion bans, and 29 states have enacted prohibitions based on gestational duration.
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100+ International Groups Decry Trump's Expected Revival of 'Deadly' Global Gag Rule
The policy, reinstated by every Republican president since Ronald Reagan, has led to "more unintended pregnancies, more unsafe abortions, and more deaths."
Jan 17, 2025
With President-elect Donald Trump expected to make curtailing global abortion access a "day one priority" after he takes office next week, as he did during his first term, more than 100 international rights organizations on Friday called for urgent action to end the global gag rule.
The rule, also known as the Mexico City Policy, has been imposed by every Republican president since Ronald Reagan and prohibits foreign non-governmental organizations from performing or "promoting" abortion care using funds from any source, if they receive U.S. family planning funding.
In 2017, one of the Trump's first acts as president was reinstating the ban and expanding it to apply to nearly all global healthcare funding, including the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), malaria prevention, nutrition aid, and other programs.
With the global gag rule "leaving the health and lives of millions of people vulnerable to political whims" over the past four decades, said the groups, "lifesaving health services have been dismantled in communities around the world"—and Trump's expected reinstatement of the policy would continue the "destructive cycle of widespread fear and confusion."
In a video posted to social media, Samira Damavandi, senior policy associate for federal issues at the Guttmacher Institute, explained that "if you're a U.S. taxpayer, you should know about the global gag rule."
The policy "uses U.S. foreign aid—your taxpayer dollars—to undermine abortion rights and reproductive health around the world," said Damavandi.
The global gag rule is imposed even in countries where abortion care is legal, noted Damavandi, effectively silencing "all discussions about abortion," with groups that receive U.S. healthcare funding barred from providing abortions, informing patients about abortion care as an option, or lobby to change abortion laws.
"Clinics have been forced to close, outreach efforts to underserved populations have been eliminated, and people have lost access to contraception and many other essential health services, resulting in more unintended pregnancies, more unsafe abortions, and more deaths," said the groups in the statement, including Amnesty International, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and Physicians for Human Rights.
The International Women's Health Coalition has tracked the effects of the global gag rule on civil society groups and health service providers in four countries—Kenya, Nepal, South Africa, and Nigeria—and has found that although the countries have divergent abortion laws, their communities have been impacted by the policy in similar ways.
Organizations in the countries reported that they stopped providing information to clients about abortion care during Trump's first term; in Kenya, two clients of one group died after seeking unsafe methods to end their pregnancies.
"Even when presidents lift the global gag rule immediately upon taking office, high-quality health partners face long delays in resuming participation in U.S. global health programs," said the groups on Friday. "Permanent repeal of the policy is urgently needed to promote sustainable progress in global health and to build and maintain long-term partnerships between the U.S. government, local organizations, and the communities that they serve."
Rights groups have previously called on Congress to pass the Global Health, Empowerment, and Rights (Global HER) Act, which would prevent presidents from unilaterally reinstating the global gag rule.
The Guttmacher Institute said it expects the Trump administration to reinstate the rule based on Trump's previous position and policies promoted within Project 2025, the right-wing agenda coauthored by at least 144 people who worked in the White House under the Republican leader.
Project 2025 also advocates for "blocking U.S. funding to the United Nations Population Fund and other organizations that promote sexual and reproductive health and rights" and redirecting international family planning funds to "faith-based organizations or organizations with limited experience in reproductive healthcare."
Guttmacher provided guidance on the likely reinstatement of the rule to international health NGOs, noting that:
- Reinstatement of the global gag rule will not affect existing contracts and will apply only to new funding agreements;
- Organizations are under no obligation to adjust their programs or partnerships to comply with the gag rule before it has been reinstated; and
- Organizations should avoid overinterpreting the policy restrictions and acting beyond what is required.
"Ending the global gag rule for good would lift the threat of reinstatement and allow U.S.-funded programs to reach their full potential," said the groups on Friday, "thus ensuring that the needs and rights of people around the world are fulfilled."
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