The Trump administration revoked a Biden period abortion rule on Friday that permits veterans to obtain abortions beneath their medical bundle.
The Division of Veteran Affairs is reversing a 2022 rule that supplied entry to abortion counseling and abortions to sure pregnant veterans along with VA beneficiaries.
“We take this motion to make sure that VA gives solely wanted medical companies to our nation’s heroes and their households,” the Division wrote in a scheduled release for the Federal Register.
Officers mentioned they have been in search of to make sure taxpayer {dollars} weren’t used to offer being pregnant terminations.
“As a matter of legislation, it’s with out query that VA has the authority to bar provision of abortion companies by way of the VA medical advantages bundle to veterans,” the discharge learn.
“From 1999 till 2022 that’s in reality what VA did. It was not till 2022 when the VA Secretary reversed this course,” they added.
The division mentioned they might not prohibit offering abortion care to pregnant girls in life-threatening circumstances, together with remedy for ectopic pregnancies or miscarriages.
GOP lawmakers lauded the transfer slamming the Biden administration for earlier modifications.
“It was incorrect that the Biden administration violated settled legislation in 2022 and started providing abortion companies by way of VA. We pushed again arduous on this disastrous coverage over the past two years to carry the Biden-Harris administration accountable and defend the lives of the unborn,” Home Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Mike Bost (Sick.) and Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (Iowa), Morgan Luttrell (Texas), Derrick Van Orden (Wis.), Keith Self (Texas), and Tom Barrett (Mich.) mentioned in a Friday statement.
“It’s easy – taxpayers don’t want their hard-earned cash spent on paying for abortions – and VA’s sole focus ought to at all times be offering service-connected well being care and advantages to the veterans they serve,” they added.
Nevertheless, others mentioned the shift in coverage will hurt servicemembers and their households following the Supreme Courtroom’s determination to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022, eliminating the constitutional proper to abortions.
Katie O’Connor, senior director of federal abortion coverage on the Nationwide Ladies’s Regulation Heart, mentioned the hassle was a “direct assault” on those that have served our nation.
“At a time when extremist lawmakers are passing merciless abortion bans and restrictions, this transfer solely deepens the disaster these legal guidelines have created — stripping veterans of their reproductive freedom and creating much more confusion about the place they’ll flip for care.
“Let me be clear: abortion is well being care,” O’Connor mentioned in a Friday assertion.
“Veterans already face distinctive challenges to their well being and well-being, together with experiencing PTSD, recovering from navy sexual trauma, and dealing with an elevated threat of suicide. Banning entry to the total vary of reproductive companies, together with abortion, additional jeopardizes their well being and security. Nobody ought to must journey a whole lot of miles, endure monetary hardship, or threat their well being simply to get the medical care they want. Our veterans deserve higher,” she added.