As President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration day approaches, leaders of the pro-life movement are highlighting policies they believe are necessary and sharing their hopes and expectations for the new administration.
Although the Trump administration and his Vice President Mike Pence will be remembered for their role in overturning the ruling Roe v. WadeTrump was criticized by many for promising during his campaign to veto a law banning abortion and for his support of in vitro fertilization.
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However, pro-life advocates and policy experts are hopeful that the new administration will take concrete action on behalf of the unborn in the post-Roe landscape.
1. Reduce public funding for abortion providers in the US.
Pro-life movement advocates and policy experts hope the Trump administration and Vice President-elect JD Vance will reverse Joe Biden-era pro-abortion policies that fund or subsidize abortion both domestically and internationally.
Public funding of abortion giant Planned Parenthood amounted to $1.6 billion between 2019 and 2021, averaging $533 million per year, according to a 2023 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
Pro-life advocates “hope the Trump administration will be even more aggressive in its efforts to cut public funding for Planned Parenthood,” Michael New, a professor at the Catholic University of America and a senior scholar at the Charlotte Lozier Institute, told CNA. —EWTN News English agency.
“’DOGE,’ the Department of Government Efficiency, headed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, is seen by some leaders as a path to cutting funding to abortion providers,” New said.
“Cutting funding to Planned Parenthood should be one of the items recommended by DOGE as an excellent way to reduce the federal budget deficit and remove a highly objectionable organization from government funding,” said Joseph Meaney, former president and senior scholar at the National Center of Catholic Bioethics.
Noah Brandt of the pro-life organization Live Action urged Trump to “defund Planned Parenthood for every taxpayer dollar it receives.”
“During its last reported year, Planned Parenthood performed 392,715 abortions, killing an average of 1,076 unborn babies each day, nearly 45 every hour, and one every 80 seconds,” Brandt told CNA.
2. Restore the “Mexico City Policy”
Addressing funding for abortion providers internationally is another important priority for pro-lifers. The “Mexico City Policy,” which Biden repealed at the beginning of his term, prevents the federal government from funding abortion providers abroad. Pro-lifers hope Trump will quickly restore this policy.
“One of the most important policies to restore is the Mexico City Policy, which restricts US international aid to entities that do not provide or promote abortion,” Meaney told CNA.
3. Reintroduce safety protections for the abortion pill
Pro-life policy experts also highlighted the importance of regulating the abortion pill to protect women’s health.
New report suggests Trump’s Food and Drug Administration should require medical professionals to report complications from chemical abortions, a requirement that was removed in 2016.
Alison Centofante of Americans United for Life—a policy-oriented pro-life advocacy group—called for an evaluation of the safety of the abortion pill regimen by implementing the FDA’s Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies (REMS) on the pill. abortive.
“These common-sense safety regulations, which were recklessly eliminated by the previous administration, are vital to protecting women. Without REMS, women are at greater risk of life-threatening complications, such as bleeding and infections, as well as being left without adequate follow-up,” Centofante told CNA.
“Ensuring that the abortion pill is regulated with appropriate safeguards is crucial to maintaining medical standards and protecting women’s health,” Centofante added.
Melanie Israel, a visiting scholar at the Heritage Foundation’s Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Life, Religion, and Family, said it’s important to show people “how unsafe these pills are.”
“It gives us additional tools to convince people who are on the fence that we need to do more to protect women and girls from these medications,” Israel said.
Pro-lifers also called for an end to chemical abortions via telemedicine, where pills are received by mail, citing safety concerns. The new administration, Live Action’s Brandt said, should “reduce the dangerous abortion pill, revoke its illegitimate approval, and immediately end dangerous chemical abortions.”
4. Implement pro-family policies
Many pro-life advocates hoped that the next administration in a post-Roe America would implement more pro-family policies.
Live Action’s Brandt called on the administration to “work to make America the most welcoming country in which to raise a family, supporting policies like expanding the child tax credit.”
“For the first time since Roe was overturned, we are hopeful to see a federal administration that prioritizes mothers and their unborn children,” added AUL’s Centofante.
Centofante advocated for “preferential treatment for mothers and families at all stages” from the new administration, as well as “practical resources to help women carry their pregnancies to term.”
In the post-Roe landscape, the new administration can pursue policies that help families thrive.
“Because we really want people to feel empowered to choose life,” Heritage’s Israel said. “We don’t want people to feel like they need to have an abortion, that that’s their only option; who have to go to great distances to travel to another state or order pills from some suspicious online pharmacy abroad.”
“We’re interested in looking at other ways of how we really help families thrive. “How do we help people feel like they can provide for a family and raise a family,” he added.
5. Prioritize bioethics in relation to in vitro fertilization
Pro-life advocates highlighted bioethical concerns around in vitro fertilization (IVF), a fertility treatment that involves the laboratory creation of large numbers of human embryos, most of which never come to term.
NCBC’s Meaney — a leading Catholic voice in bioethics — argued that educating people about bioethical concerns related to IVF is “a very high priority for pro-life groups.”
“This technique is not an innocent or beneficial solution for infertility. It is a horrible practice that results in the death or permanent freezing of more than 90% of human embryos conceived in laboratories. In many countries, more children die from IVF than from abortion each year,” Meaney explained.
Trump has been criticized by pro-life leaders for his promise to make IVF more accessible.
Israel noted that Europe has much more “solid” IVF policies, while in the United States “the policies are more Wild West.” He advocated for research into “some of the alternative protocols with restorative reproductive medicine.”
Centofante added that he hoped the new administration would “re-task the Presidential Bioethics Council with the task of guiding ethical policies on emerging biomedical issues.”
6. Appoint a pro-life cabinet
Pro-life advocates also highlighted the importance of having pro-life staff.
Leadership in Cabinet positions across departments, Centofante noted, is “crucial to ensuring the protection of long-standing pro-life laws…that prevent taxpayer funds from being used for abortion.”
The Trump administration’s staff nominations are a key concern for pro-life advocates, especially at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Department of Justice (DOJ).
HHS plays an important role in abortion issues, managing regulations that protect conscience rights for medical professionals and federal funding for abortion providers.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the former pro-abortion Democrat nominated for HHS secretary, recently expressed support for pro-life policies. He promised to reinstitute the Mexico City Policy, end national funding for abortion, and restore conscience protections for health care providers. However, former Vice President Mike Pence urged senators to oppose RFK Jr.’s nomination because of his stance on abortion.
At the Justice Department, pro-life leaders are hopeful that Trump’s nominee for attorney general, Pam Bondi, will end the persecution of pro-life activists under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entries (FACE) Act.
At her Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday, Bondi promised to end the political use of the FACE Act against pro-life activists.
Live Action’s Brandt called on the next administration to “forgive all unjustly imprisoned peaceful pro-life activists, including Joan Bell, Bevelyn Williams, Lauren Handy and others, who are unjustly prosecuted and imprisoned by the current DOJ.”
“If she is confirmed as attorney general, she will not allow the FACE Act to be used to disparately target pro-lifers,” Israel said. “That’s an example of why it really matters to have that pro-life presence throughout the administration, not just in one agency.”
Translated and adapted by ACI Prensa. Originally published in CNA.
Kate Quinones
Kate Quiñones is a staff writer for Catholic News Agency and a member of College Fix. He has publications in the Wall Street Journal, the Denver Catholic Register and CatholicVote. He graduated from Hillsdale College. She lives in Colorado with her husband.