The Pentagon struck down a Biden administration policy that covered the travel costs of service members and their dependents traveling across state lines to receive abortions, according to a memo released earlier this week.
The move, which took effect Wednesday, marks the latest in both the restoration of anti-abortion policies that existed under the first term of President Donald Trump and the recent effort to undo social policies relating to the armed forces that critics contend distract from the military’s primary objectives.
Former President Joe Biden and former Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in early 2023 established a policy to reimburse troops and dependents who had to travel out of the state where they are stationed to obtain abortions. This came as a result of the overturning of Roe v. Wade and a multitude of states implementing gestational age restrictions and other constraints on legal abortions.
Although the federal government cannot pay for abortion directly, an October 2022 Defense Department memo argued that existing law “does not prohibit the use of funds to pay expenses, such as a per diem or travel expenses, that are incidental to the abortion.”
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) held up over 400 military nominations in 2023 in an attempt to pressure the Biden administration to end the policy. The Senate quickly voted unanimously to promote those officers following Tuberville’s announcement that he would halt his blockade.
Tuberville praised Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s leadership in a post on X on Friday, saying that “common sense has been restored to our military.”
“For the past two years, I’ve been sounding the alarm about the Pentagon’s illegal and immoral practice of using taxpayer dollars to fund abortions,” Tuberville said. “I took a lot of heat when I stood alone for nearly a year in holding senior Pentagon promotions over this, but as of today, it was all worth it.”
Approximately 40% of female US service members live or are currently stationed in a state that has curtailed abortion access following the overturning of Roe, according to a RAND study published in September 2022. Women comprise approximately one-fifth of the US military.
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During his first week in office, Trump pardoned the nearly two dozen protesters prosecuted by the Biden Justice Department for demonstrating outside of abortion clinics in violation of federal law.
Trump last week also reinstated the Mexico City policy, which prevents organizations receiving U.S. federal global health funding from providing access to abortion-related information or abortion services as a family planning mechanism.