The "HER Act" Could Stop Trump's Global Gag Order
The Trump administration rolled back well-established funding for world-wide health crises and disasters, and women will be disproportionately affected.
Donald Trump directed his administration last Friday to block global aid recipients from telling patients about abortion, reinstating his policy known as the “global gag rule.” These latest restrictions, also known as the Mexico City Policy, require foreign non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to certify that they will not “perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning” using funds from any source, including non-US funds, as a condition of receiving US government global family planning funding.
On January 28, 2021, President Joe Biden rescinded the Mexico City Policy, marking an end to a four-year period under the Trump administration that saw the greatest expansion of the policy in its history. In 2017, Donald Trump reinstated the policy and also significantly expanded it to encompass nearly all US bilateral global health assistance.
The Trump administration’s reimplementation of the global gag rule comes on the heels of several executive actions last week that severely curtail LGBTQ+ rights, gender equality, and reproductive rights in the US and all over the world. Trump also issued an executive order on Friday that further strengthens the Hyde Amendment, which bars federal dollars from being used to fund abortion and rescinds two Biden administration executive actions — one compelling the government to expand abortion access, and the other defining abortion as health care.
Trump has simultaneously shuttered all activities for USAID, the agency, which previously extended assistance to countries who are recovering from disaster, trying to escape poverty, and engaging in democratic reforms. USAID delivers billions of dollars in humanitarian aid overseas, funding that advocates say provides a critical lifeline to more than 100 countries at only a small fraction of the overall federal budget.
Since Saturday, the website for USAID, along with 8,000 other federal web pages across more than a dozen US government websites have been taken down, and an historical record number of employees have been told to stop working and to sign resignation letters in order to receive any pay moving forward. As justification for this shocking lateral move that involves Article II expenditures normally overseen by Congress, Trump has said the USAID agency, is being “run by a bunch of radical lunatics.” Billionaire Elon Musk, who heads Trump’s DOGE government efficiency initiative, has also called USAID, an organization created by President John F. Kennedy, a “criminal organization.”
In response to Trump’s reinstatement of the deadly global gag rule, several female US Senators in the US House and Senate have introduced the Global Health, Empowerment, and Rights (HER) Act, which would “affirmatively establish that a foreign non-governmental organization shall not be disqualified from receiving certain US international development assistance solely because the organization provides medical services using non-US government funds if the medical services do not violate the laws of the country in which they are being provided.”
The gag rule’s wide reach means that global efforts to prevent the spread of HIV, to promote contraception, and to fight diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis will be drastically curtailed. The HER Act would exempt foreign organizations from being subjected to Trump’s latest gag order, and the bill would permanently end the Conservative anti-abortion policy that risks the health and lives of women, girls, young people, and LGBTQ+ communities around the world.
Planned Parenthood Federation of America President and CEO Alexis McGill Johnson issued the following statement:
“When in effect, the global gag rule restricts the medical information that health care providers can offer, limits free speech, and stifles local advocacy efforts by prohibiting people from participating in public policy debates.
Numerous research studies over the course of decades and the direct experiences of organizations working in diverse settings demonstrate that the global gag rule impedes access to a range of health services – including reproductive, maternal and child health care, HIV prevention and treatment, tuberculosis, malaria and even some nutrition programs – by cutting off funding for experienced providers…
..Elected officials have no business interfering with our personal health care decisions — and yet, anti-abortion lawmakers continue to champion an unpopular agenda, at home and abroad. Our leaders in Congress must fight to protect access to critical reproductive health care services because it is clear the Trump administration won’t.”
While implementing the HER Act would mean that Congress could course-correct several of Trump’s Executive Orders that have rolled back civil liberties and funding, it is not clear if it will have enough support to actually pass and stop this massive federal government re-organization. While the bill does have the support of Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, it is not likely that it has the support of many other, quintessential conservative voters in Congress. You can get involved now by following the instructions here, and contacting your Representatives and Senators to demand that they support the HER Act today.
Fun (and maddening) Disclaimer: None of this would be happening if we had ratified an Equal Rights Amendment before the first Trump administration.
Amee Vanderpool writes the SHERO Newsletter, is an attorney, published author, contributor to newspapers and magazines, and an analyst for BBC radio. She can be reached at avanderpool@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @girlsreallyrule.
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