Here’s How Trump Bans Birth Control

4.7.26

Click to skip ahead: Here’s How Trump Bans Birth Control; Anti-Abortion Glossary: “Reproductive Goals”; A Good News/Bad News Update in the Mifepristone Lawsuit; Congratulations, Wisconsin; Ohio Republicans Consider Pregnancy Registry; In the States: Illinois, Maryland, Virginia, Wyoming, West Virginia; Quick National Hits

---

Here’s How Trump Bans Birth Control

The Trump administration is giving a master class in how to ban contraception: not loudly or all at once—but quietly, slowly, and under the guise of protecting women’s health.

This one is important, so stick with me…

Last week, I warned that the White House seemed poised to drop a Title X bombshell. A Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) spokesperson said that the next cycle of federal family planning dollars would “prioritize life and promote the pro-family agenda.”

I took that to mean that the administration planned to follow through on a specific Project 2025 promise: revamping the Title X program and funneling its birth control funding to crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs). Given that CPCs won’t even talk about contraception—let alone dispense it—the move would act as a de facto, nationwide birth control ban.

Regular readers know that Abortion, Every Day has flagged this strategy for years, pointing out that crisis pregnancy centers are the perfect vehicle for banning contraception. After all, Republicans don’t need a law banning birth control, they just have to make it impossible to get. Replacing real healthcare providers with religious groups is a huge step towards that goal.

That’s why anti-abortion lawmakers and activists have spent the past few years jacking up funding for the fake clinics, passing laws that shield them from state regulation, and positioning the groups as reasonable alternatives to real reproductive health clinics.

This latest news, however, is the biggest escalation yet: POLITICO uncovered new Trump administration guidance for Title X grantees—a document that includes no mention of birth control other than claims that it’s dangerous and “overprescribed.”

How can the nation’s family planning program not mention birth control at all? Well, like this:

“The guidance instead promotes ‘natural family planning methods,’ such as period tracking apps and other forms of fertility awareness that have higher failure rates than hormonal birth control. It also asserts that a key goal of the program is to ‘strengthen family formation and assist clients in achieving healthy pregnancies.’”

That’s right, the Trump administration wants to turn Title X into some tradwife training ground—focusing more on getting women to have babies than helping them prevent unwanted pregnancies.

It’s not a coincidence that the language of this document is near identical to Project 2025, which calls for Title X to be “reframed…around fertility awareness and holistic family planning.” Nor is it by luck that CPCs have started to rebrand themselves as “fertility clinics” or “restorative reproductive medicine” centers.

Conservatives have been planning this shift for a long time.

Kylie is working on an explainer about how this document fits into Republicans’ broader attacks on birth control—so keep an eye on your inboxes. In the meantime, let’s dig into some (very telling) language.

Anti-Abortion Glossary: “Reproductive Goals”

The Trump administration’s new Title X guidance is like a Where’s Waldo of anti-abortion bullshit working very hard to sound medically credible. Here’s just one section of one page:

You’ll be familiar with some of the terms in the document, like “fertility awareness” and “restorative” medicine. And I know we’re all tired of MAHA’s favorite: “root causes.”

But there are some other phrases worth watching out for—like “reproductive goals” or “preconception health.” Sounds innocuous enough, I know! After all, they’re both real health terms. What conservatives have done here, however, is use those phrases in lieu of talking about contraception. The idea is to erase birth control from the healthcare conversation entirely, and reduce women’s reproductive health to our ability to conceive.

I’m guessing we’re going to see a lot more of these terms in the coming months.

A Good News/Bad News Update in the Mifepristone Lawsuit

You may have seen headlines this afternoon reporting that a judge paused Louisiana’s lawsuit against the FDA, keeping telehealth access to abortion medication in place. That’s true, and it’s good news that people can continue to get abortion pills as they have been.

But don’t get it twisted: this was not a ‘good’ ruling.

First, a quick refresher: Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill is suing the FDA, arguing that telehealth abortion access allows abusers to secretly poison women with mifepristone. (Republicans figured out that claiming to “protect women” is a whole lot more popular than admitting you want to ban abortion.)

Earlier this year, the FDA asked the court to pause the suit—supposedly to finish its ‘safety review’ of mifepristone. In reality, the Trump administration knows abortion is a political loser, and they’re trying to avoid a high-profile fight until after the midterms.

U.S. District Judge David C. Joseph gave them that time, though he urged the FDA “to act with all deliberate speed” in their so-called study.

While telehealth access remains the same for now, it’s important to note that neither the White House nor this judge is trying to do abortion pills any favors.

In its request to pause the case, the Trump administration didn’t disagree with Louisiana’s core argument—and even suggested the FDA could end telehealth access to mifepristone itself, depending on the outcome of its review.

And while Joseph granted the stay, he also made clear where he stands—writing that Louisiana had shown “irreparable harm” and is “likely to succeed on the merits.”

In other words, nothing about this ruling means that abortion pills are safe. Actually, it signals the opposite. The Trump administration is buying time, the court seems to agree with Louisiana, and the groundwork is being laid to restrict mifepristone as soon as it’s politically convenient.

To learn more about conservatives co-opting feminist language around abuse victims, read Kylie’s explainer below:

Exposing Republicans' Bad-Faith Abortion 'Coercion' Obsession

Congratulations, Wisconsin

Three for three!

One of the benefits of publishing the newsletter late tonight is that we get to report that Chris Taylor has won a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court—the third pro-choice judge to do so since the end of Roe.

Taylor’s win—which the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel called an “easy victory”—further expands liberals’ majority on the bench to 5-2.

Abortion played a major role in the race; and in the end, Republican Maria Lazar simply couldn’t outrun her anti-abortion extremism. Taylor put out several ads reminding voters of Lazar’s connection to groups that don’t believe rape victims should be able to access abortion care. She also made clear in a recent debate that Lazar would have supported a controversial 1849 abortion ban.

And while the Republican judge worked overtime to claim that she would respect Wisconsin’s precedent, Americans have heard that song before.

I don’t know how many times we have to say it, but one more won’t hurt: ABORTION WINS ELECTIONS.

Congratulations, Wisconsin—we’re thrilled for you.

Ohio Republicans Consider Pregnancy Registry

Last month, AED told you about legislation in Ohio that would mandate every pregnancy be registered with the state—beginning to end. Incredibly, HB 754 is still kicking.

The bill would require healthcare providers to file a “certificate of life” with the Ohio Department of Health within ten days of examining a pregnant patient and detecting a fetal heartbeat. It also mandates that “fetal deaths” be registered with the state, and that providers specify whether a pregnancy ended in miscarriage, abortion, or stillbirth.

Just as bad: if a fetus is deemed to have died in a “violent, suspicious, unusual, or sudden” manner, a coroner or medical examiner would be brought in. Who, exactly, determines what’s “suspicious” isn’t specified.

As we wrote a few weeks ago, this is about building an infrastructure for pregnancy surveillance—and a pathway for criminalization. Fourth-year medical student Ellena Privitera puts it plainly:

“As physicians, we can only surmise that this legislation is intended to further burden, discriminate against, and penalize people seeking or providing abortion care. At the same time, it could further traumatize and humiliate women experiencing miscarriage or stillbirth.”

Unfortunately, that’s just one of a whole host of anti-abortion legislation Republicans are trying to advance (despite voters codifying protections for abortion in 2023). The good news is that people are paying attention: this week, more than 150 physicians in Ohio signed a letter opposing the bills.

In the States: Illinois, Maryland, Virginia, Wyoming, West Virginia

That was a lot, so let’s start off state news with something positive: over in Illinois, Democrats are pushing legislation that would create a new stream of funding for abortion-seekers with limited or no insurance.

HB 5408 would establish an Abortion Access Fund Grant Program similar to the one launched in Maryland: the state could wield funds collected from a surcharge on insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act.

Bill sponsor Rep. Anna Moeller sees the program as yet another way for Illinois to lead the way in protecting abortion rights:

“Clearly things can change very quickly, as we saw with the overturn of Roe. Illinois, I think, has done a lot, but it's kind of up to other states to do the same. We just have to stay vigilant.”

Speaking of Maryland, some terrific news: after a few years of failed attempts, the legislature has passed a bill to codify protections for emergency abortion care. (It’s basically a state version of EMTALA.) The legislation now heads to the governor, who is expected to sign.

More good news, this time in Virginia, where a bill to enshrine protections for contraception is headed to Gov. Abigail Spanberger. The Right to Contraception Act would also allow people to sue if that right is violated.

This comes as the Trump administration is launching an unprecedented attack on birth control via the Title X family planning program. (The Virginia Mercury reports that clinics in the state are girding themselves.)

AED is keeping a close eye on Wyoming, where the state’s only abortion clinic is challenging a recently-passed—and unconstitutional—six-week ban. Remember, Republicans passed the ban in spite of a state Supreme Court ruling that protected abortion rights. The Casper Star-Tribune has a breakdown of the case, and Wyoming Public Radio weighs in with a piece on how abortion bans impact the economy.

A West Virginia crisis pregnancy center is framing its mobile unit as a fix for the state’s maternal healthcare desert. The only problem? The group doesn’t really offer medical care beyond pregnancy tests and ultrasounds—and we know how well that works out. It was just last week that we learned a Texas CPC nearly killed a woman when they missed her ectopic pregnancy.

Consider it yet another reminder that conservatives aren’t just pushing this false narrative about CPCs out nationally—but locally. They want voters to believe that it’s perfectly fine for women’s healthcare to be limited to dollar store pregnancy tests and ultrasounds performed in vans.

Quick hits:

• The Indiana Capital Chronicle reports on Planned Parenthood closures in the state;

• The Mississippi Free Press has more on the bill headed to the governor that would make it a crime to mail abortion pills to patients;

• Iowa Republicans are pushing ahead with a bill to restrict abortion pills, even as the legislative session is close to ending.

“Two of my daughters are in college, and the younger of the two wrote a short essay talking about how when she was younger, her mother told her to only say, when asked, that her dad was an OB-GYN and leave it at that. Her mom did not want anyone to do us harm. But when Roe was overturned, my daughter wrote in her essay, ‘To hell with this. I need to talk about this,’ and she talked about being open with her friends at school about what I do.”

- Arizona OBGYN Dr. Paul Isaacson, one of the abortion providers who successfully challenged three of the state’s abortion restrictions

Quick National Hits

• The Advocate digs into how attacks on abortion and gender affirming care are inextricably linked;

• Reproductive Freedom for All and National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice are pushing for the Melt ICE Act and Stop Shackling and Detaining Pregnant Women Act to protect pregnant women and girls in ICE detention centers;

• Ms. magazine recapped the Trump administration’s escalating attacks on unaccompanied, immigrant minors;

• Finally, Sylvia Ghazarian of the Women’s Reproductive Rights Assistance Project is right: we’re in the midst of a maternal mortality crisis thanks to abortion bans.