Want to protect girls’ rights for generations? Endorse this piece of legislation today.
At She’s the First, we fight for a world where every girl chooses her own future. This agency includes power over her own body and access to vital healthcare, including abortion and related counseling services.
President Biden signed an executive order today rescinding the “Global Gag Rule” that President Trump put into effect in 2017. The Global Gag Rule was devastating for girls and women worldwide, threatening their lives with unsafe abortions, unplanned pregnancies, and limited access to healthcare.
While President Biden’s order is good news, it does not go far enough because future presidents could bring the Global Gag Rule back. To permanently repeal this horrifying policy, we must push our legislators to pass the Global Health, Empowerment, and Rights Act.
What is the Global Gag Rule?
Also known as the Mexico City Policy, this is an executive order traditionally signed by Republican presidents to cut family-planning funding to international NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that engage in any abortion-related work, including referrals to clinics, patient counseling, or advocacy for legal reform. To be clear: American money never funded abortions; funding for those programs came from other sources, but organizations were refused U.S. funding for family planning regardless.
President Trump took the order further by expanding the gag rule to apply to all health funding, meaning that an organization with reproductive health services would no longer receive funding for any of their services if they mentioned abortion in their programming. As a result, organizations were forced to choose between receiving funding for their programs devoted to fighting malaria, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and other diseases, or to never speak about abortion as a family planning possibility. $8.8 billion in global health funding has been restricted, ensuring that its recipients cannot mention abortion in their family planning services.
What happened as a result?
According to a research report by Planned Parenthood Global, there has been an increase in unsafe abortions and unplanned pregnancies worldwide since the implementation of the policy in 2017. Because many organizations decline funding when it comes with strings limiting their ability to work, they have fewer resources at large to deliver health services, and women and girls suffer as a result of less access to contraception and counseling.
What do we do now?
By signing the executive order that rescinds the Global Gag Rule, President Biden has taken a major step to improve health outcomes for women and girls worldwide. But the strength of an executive order is balanced by its greatest weakness: it can be just as easily undone as it was inked. The next Republican president can reinstate it with the swipe of a pen.
The Senate must pass the “Global Health, Empowerment, and Rights Act,” sponsored by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a Foreign Services Committee member. The act will permanently repeal the Global Gag Rule, allowing foreign NGOs to receive U.S. funding despite any health services they offer, including any abortion-related services.
She’s the First has already endorsed this bill, but you can too. Please email your members of Congress to demand that they pass the Global H.E.R. Act quickly. PAI has a tool to make this easy: https://pai.gospringboard.com/secure/support-permanent-repeal-global-gag-rule
By endorsing this bill today, we can protect the health and safety of women and girls worldwide for generations to come.
BACKGROUND
Read the full text of the Global HER Act:
Studies on the impact of the policy:
https://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/89/12/11-091660/en/
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(19)30267-0/fulltext
Further reading:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/01/28/biden-trump-abortion-global-gag-rule-faq/
