One week after taking office, President Joe Biden is reversing a policy widely known as the global gag rule, which restricts abortion access around the world. Today, January 28, 2021, Biden signed an executive order rescinding the Mexico City policy (named for where the rule was originally crafted), which bars international health organizations that receive U.S. funding from providing abortion services, information, and referrals—even if no U.S. dollars go toward those abortion-related services.
“Across the country and around the world, people—particularly women, Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, LGBTQ+ people, and those with low incomes—have been denied access to reproductive health care,” the White House statement reads. The Biden-Harris Administration will “protect and expand access to comprehensive reproductive health care” domestically and globally by immediately rescinding the gag rule, according to the memo, which also covers actions to strengthen and expand the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid.
The global gag rule was first enacted by Ronald Reagan in 1984 and has been alternately repealed (by Democrats) and reinstated (by Republicans) many times since, SELF reported previously.
Three days after taking office in 2017, Trump brought the ban back. (This was just one of the many actions he took to restrict reproductive rights, by rolling back abortion access and birth control coverage.) Trump not only reinstated the extremely restrictive policy but also broadened it to include governmental organizations, which were previously exempt. The policy basically forces health care and family planning organizations to either take a funding cut or stop providing or even talking about abortions.
The move was widely criticized for curtailing access to abortion as well as, crucially, contraception, since many of the organizations affected also provide contraception. The Guttmacher Institute estimated in 2016 that for every $10 million cut in U.S. aid to these international organizations, 440,000 fewer people would receive contraception, SELF reported previously.
Biden’s memo also directs the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to “take immediate action to consider whether to rescind regulations under its Title X family planning program” enacted by Trump in 2019. Often referred to as a domestic gag rule, these restrictions barred providers from receiving Title X federal funds for family planning and reproductive health services if they also provide abortion services, counseling, or referrals (with non-Title X funds), SELF reported previously. (Title X is under the governance of the HHS, so Biden can’t simply rewrite the rule by executive order, as he can with the global gag rule.)
Reproductive health care organizations praise the administration’s swift actions but say much more needs to be done in the U.S. and abroad. “Today, Biden will take the first step toward expanding access to reproductive freedom. It’s an important step, but it’s just the first one. There’s still so much more we need to do,” NARAL Pro-Choice America tweeted. The Guttmacher Institute called the executive order “necessary but not sufficient.”
“The past four years of Trump’s Global Gag Rule have been detrimental to reproductive health services and rights globally,” Melvine Ouyo, a former clinic director for Family Health Options Kenya, the country’s largest health care provider, said in a statement for the Center for Reproductive Rights. “The policy’s impacts not only have been devastating to marginalized communities, but also to health care providers, organizations and their partnerships, leading to clinic closures, staff layoffs, family planning program cuts, and generally disrupting the public health system.”
“Today’s actions of rescinding the global gag rule and taking the important first step of undoing the harmful domestic gag rule are critical for patients accessing health care in the U.S. and around the world,” Physicians for Reproductive Health president and CEO Jamila Perritt, M.D., said in a statement. “Pregnant people need accurate information about their options and referrals right away.” Dr. Perritt adds, “I look forward to the additional steps that the Biden-Harris Administration will take to protect and expand access to health care, including reproductive health care.”