Surgeon General Nominee Calls Contraception "Disrespect of Life"

2.26.26

Click to skip ahead: Surgeon General Nominee Attacks Hormonal Birth Control; The Pink-Pill Pipeline’s Latest Addition; Listen Up: The Heritage Foundation’s Plan for Our Daughters; Legislation Watch; North Carolina Woman Arrested Over 1979 Pregnancy; In the States: Missouri, Virginia, Wyoming; Abortion Went Unmentioned in Trump’s SOTU; Meta AI is Censoring Abortion & Birth Control Information; You Love to See It: M&A Hotline

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Surgeon General Nominee Attacks Hormonal Birth Control

We already knew that the wellness influencer the Trump administration tapped to be Surgeon General of the United States was anti-birth control. Last year, Abortion, Every Day flagged that Casey Means had done this wacky interview with Tucker Carlson where she called hormonal birth control a “disrespect of life.”

“You’ve got these medications that are literally shutting down the hormones in the female body that create this cyclical, life-giving nature of women. We basically told women: these hormones don’t matter. Your ability to create the most miraculous of miracles—life—just shut it down.”

Yikes!

And while Means tried to keep it a bit more diplomatic at her confirmation hearing yesterday, she couldn’t help but get into a heated back-and-forth with U.S. Sen. Patty Murray when asked about the birth control pill.

A few things. First, it’s not a coincidence that the Trump administration has picked an anti-contraception nut to be the country’s top doctor—this is another sign that the White House’s war on birth control is picking up steam. (Remember, this is an administration who claims that common forms of contraception—like IUDs and the pill—are actually abortions.)

Means also dropped an interesting breadcrumb in her response to Sen. Murray: she said that doctors don’t have the time to give an “informed consent” conversation about the risks of hormonal birth control.

Regular readers will know where this is going: informed consent is the exact term Republicans use when they propose and pass certain abortion restrictions—like legislation that mandates doctors tell patients that abortion is dangerous, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Would Means support similar legislation around hormonal birth control? Bills that require doctors to read from a script of MAHA-approved bullshit?

AED has long-warned that attacks on birth control won’t come all at once—but that access will be chipped away at, a little at a time. It seems like Trump’s nominee just gave us a clue about what that might look like.

The Pink-Pill Pipeline’s Latest Addition

We all know that birth control disinformation has become a regular thing on social media, and that it’s particularly targeted towards young women. The idea is to convince teen girls and young women that contraception—one of the most important innovations for women’s freedom—is actually bad for them. That way, when Republicans move to pass restrictions, they can credibly claim it’s to protect women’s health.

But that attack on contraception is just one part of a much broader pink pill pipeline: like algorithms pushing tradwife content, or influencers talking about the “princess treatment” and how to stay “feminine.” Now, there’s a new addition to that very insidious cultural campaign.

Variety reports that former Bachelor host Chris Harrison is heading up a new reality series, greenlit by Fox Nation, that showcases “traditional marriage.”

In a casting call for the project, Harrison said the show was looking for young women “who want a traditional, marriage-minded partnership,” and those “who believe in clear roles.” Clear roles really says it all, huh?

Anyone who watches reality dating shows won’t find this surprising. Series like Love is Blind have been getting progressively more conservative—with contestants who either want to marry a tradwife, or want to be one.

And again, this is part of a cultural campaign to indoctrinate young women. (After all, who watches reality dating shows?) I wish I saw progressives making similar cultural moves or moments.

Read more about the “pink pill pipeline” below:

We Need to Talk About the Pink-Pill Pipeline

Listen Up: The Heritage Foundation’s Plan for Our Daughters

Speaking of attacks on young women: A few weeks ago, I wrote a column about the Heritage Foundation’s latest plan to push young women out of college and into early marriage and motherhood. Earlier this week, I dug deeper into that plan with Rose Aguliar at KALW, the Bay Area’s public radio station. You can listen to our conversation below:

Legislation Watch

I told you yesterday about a New Hampshire bill (HB 1590) that would change the state’s 24 week abortion restriction to 20 weeks. But there’s more: under this legislation, healthcare providers and abortion patients could be charged with homicide for abortions after 20 weeks.

This is outrageous for all the reasons, but also consider that 20 weeks is about the time that women find out about serious fetal abnormalities. (Under this legislation, there would be no such exception.) The good news? In Depth New Hampshire reports that residents and experts alike seriously showed up to oppose the bill at a House committee hearing yesterday.

Maine had a public hearing yesterday on LD 335 which would allocate emergency funding to Maine’s reproductive healthcare clinics gutted by the Trump administration.

Oregon Democrats are advancing legislation to expand the state’s shield laws: HB 4088 would prevent the extradition of healthcare providers, increase privacy protections, and protect providers from professional discipline or attacks on their licenses.

The Tennessee Senate has passed HB 0169, which would mandate insurance companies cover up to 12 months’ worth of birth control. The bill now heads to the governor’s desk. Georgia legislators are considering similar legislation (HB 1138).

Virginia lawmakers are also working on contraception legislation: the Right to Contraception Act (HB 6) passed the state Senate this week—but the House needs to accept some changes made before it heads to Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s desk. Remember, former Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation to codify a right to contraception—twice. So this is a welcome change.

Finally, we’re keeping a close eye on states advancing legislation to restrict abortion pills and punish those who help patients obtain them, like Mississippi (HB 1613), Kentucky (HB 646), South Dakota (HB 1274), and West Virginia (SB 173).

North Carolina Woman Arrested Over 1979 Pregnancy

A North Carolina woman was arrested this week over her pregnancy from nearly 50 years ago. The 69 year old woman faces a felony charge for ‘concealing the birth of a child’ in connection with remains found in a landfill in 1979. The Columbus County Sheriff’s Office says advances in DNA technology helped them identify the woman.

Law enforcement is increasingly using at-home ancestry tests to investigate decades-old pregnancy losses. Just last month, Kentucky police arrested a 55-year-old woman over her 1991 pregnancy loss; and in 2024, a Florida woman’s at-home DNA test led to her grandmother being arrested for a pregnancy loss 27 years ago.

What’s especially chilling? Most people taking AncestryDNA or 23andMe tests don’t realize that they could be inadvertently helping police build a case against their grandparents or distant relatives for ‘crimes’ committed decades earlier.

These women were in the midst of medical trauma from miscarriage, stillbirth, or other pregnancy-related emergencies. All of them needed care, not criminalization. And an important reminder from Pregnancy Justice’s Karen Thompson, who notes how often police get it wrong:

“We’ve represented women and tracked dozens of cases across the country where they were prosecuted—often as grandmothers and often decades after suffering a devastating stillbirth—because DNA tests linked them to fetal remains and junk forensic science was then used to claim ‘proof’ that a baby was born alive.”

I’m reminded of a recent case in Ohio, where a 21 year old was charged with ‘abuse of a corpse’ and ‘outrage of community sensibilities’ after her pregnancy remains were found in the trash. At their core, that’s what so many pregnancy-related criminal charges wind up being about: outrage and spectacle.

And because law enforcement finds fetal remains unpleasant, someone must be punished and publicly shamed. No matter how many years have passed.

In the States: Missouri, Virginia, Wyoming

U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley is convinced Missouri voters will pass an abortion ban this November—even though those same voters already enshrined abortion rights in their state constitution in 2024.

Hawley made the case at a Republican party event this week, where he said Amendment 3 would “end abortion on demand.” And no, you’re not imagining it: the pro-choice measure Missouri voters passed in 2024 was also called Amendment 3. Republicans are banking on that confusion. The goal is to get people to think they’re voting for something they already supported, except this time it bans abortion instead of protecting it.

Why not tell the truth? Well, because the GOP knows that voters oppose abortion bans—even Republican voters. As STLPR points out, hundreds of thousands of Missourians who voted for Trump also voted for the pro-choice Amendment 3 in 2024. (Hawley claims they just didn’t understand what they were voting for. 🙄)

This has been one of the most egregious examples of anti-abortion attacks on democracy, so we’ll be keeping a close eye.

You’ve gotta be kidding. Yet another Virginia town is weaponizing zoning laws to sidestep state abortion protections. Just a few weeks ago, Lynchburg passed an ordinance prohibiting clinics from operating near schools, churches, public libraries, parks, children’s museums, and day care centers. In other words, there’s pretty much nowhere clinics are allowed to open in Lynchburg—even though abortion is legal in Virginia.

Now, the Virginia Independent reports that Roanoke County is trying to pull something similar: the board of supervisors unanimously passed a resolution directing its planning commission to identify zoning changes that would limit where clinics can operate.

Apparently the board snuck the resolution into an everyday logistical agenda, hoping no one would notice. (This is why local government matters so much! Run for local office, please!) From David Radford, vice chairman of the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors:

“If we don’t address it in the matter of zoning, you could have these abortion clinics pop up like vape shops. They could move into a strip center, and we want to direct where they’re going to be.”

These men are the fucking worst. Thankfully, citizens will have the chance to weigh in before any zoning changes take effect—but it’s clear that this is becoming a thing in Virginia. You can bet it won’t be long before antis export the strategy to other states, too.

In better news, the Wyoming Supreme Court has denied the state’s petition to rehear their abortion case. Remember, the court struck down the state’s two abortion bans last month—ruling that abortion is healthcare, and that healthcare is protected under the Wyoming constitution. Republicans have been throwing a hissy fit ever since, threatening to change the makeup of the bench, trying to push through restrictions regardless—and even moving to withhold security funding for the court.

All of which is to say: the GOP’s ask that the court rehear their case is probably the least controversial thing they’ve done lately. Still, it’s nice to see them shot down yet again!

Abortion Went Unmentioned in Trump’s SOTU

Shocker: Donald Trump omitted any mention of the women killed by his abortion bans in this week’s State of the Union address. In fact, the president didn’t mention abortion at all. That’s because he knows his party’s embrace of bans is toxic—especially in a key election year.

The omission didn’t go unnoticed by anti-abortion leaders, who warned the White House, “The most loyal voter is the pro-life voter.”

The extremist organization Students for Life was also peeved that Trump touted the story of a veteran who used IVF. In a scathing tweet, the group wrote that they didn’t want women to “experience the joy of motherhood…at the expense of innocent lives.”

“The IVF industry freezes, discards, and practices eugenics on humans in embryonic form, treating children in their earliest stages as disposable. They end more lives than Planned Parenthood.”

These reactions from top ‘pro-life’ groups come after months of simmering tensions between the movement and the White House for not (yet) banning abortion pills. Let’s be clear, though: they’re all on the same side. Trump’s camp simply knows better than to say as much in a decidedly pro-choice nation in an election year.

Meta AI is Censoring Abortion & Birth Control Information

Mother Jones got a look at some leaked Meta documents showing that the social media giant has banned its AI chatbots from giving minors information about abortion, menstrual health, STI and HIV prevention, birth control and more.

Think about what that means for a generation of young people who go to chatbots rather than Google. Teens who used to be able to identify their local Planned Parenthood or easily find information on their sexual health will be left in the dark.

This isn’t happening in a vacuum. Right now, states are actively suing to ban pro-choice ads, legislators are proposing bills to criminalize websites that share information about abortion pills, and federal legislation like the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) would require age verification to access certain websites. (Which sounds innocuous until you realize it will make it harder for young people to access reproductive health information anonymously.)

It’s a good reminder of how much work the abortion rights movement should be doing on AI right now.

You Love to See It: M&A Hotline

HuffPost’s Alanna Vagianos has a must-read profile of the Miscarriage & Abortion Hotline and its director, Dr. April Lockley. The group has over 100 volunteer medical professionals on staff and fielded more than 14,000 calls last year. And what’s shifted since the end of Roe, Lockley says, is what callers are afraid of. It used to be symptoms and the experience itself. Now it’s criminalization:

“The anxiety around a medical provider knowing they’re pregnant at all, the concern about legal safety—that anxiety is much more prevalent. ‘I went to the doctor, now my doctor knows I’m pregnant, are they gonna turn me in to the police?’ We get those questions all the time.”

In a moment when conservatives are working overtime to cut off every possible avenue for abortion information and mutual aid, groups like the M&A Hotline—there every day, picking up the phone—are essential.