Rep. Lois Frankel (FL-21) issued the following statement after President Joe Biden signed a Presidential Memorandum reviewing the Trump Administration’s Title X gag rule and reversing the global gag rule, both of which harmed women’s access to health care in the United States and around the globe.

“Thank you, President Joe Biden, for saving lives and boosting the health of women in our country and around the world with today’s executive action,” said Rep. Frankel. “For women to reach their potential and dreams we must have access to full reproductive health care including safe, legal abortion. Today’s action by President Biden reverses the prior administration’s deadly and ineffective policies that effectively cut off even basic primary care to countless women and men, and endangered women and girls at home and abroad.”   

The Title X Family Planning Program, enacted under President Richard Nixon in 1970, is a federal grant program that provides low income and uninsured individuals with family planning, primary care, and preventative health services. Despite federal law that prohibits the use of federal money for abortion, in 2018 the Trump Administration withdrew funding from health care providers who, outside of their federally funded capacity, offer abortion services or refer patients for abortion. It is estimated that 876 clinics across the country, many of which are run by Planned Parenthood, lost Title X funding after choosing not to comply. This loss prevented thousands of low-income women from accessing affordable reproductive health care, including cancer screenings, and testing and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases.

Also known as the Mexico City Policy, the global gag rule blocks federal funding for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) receiving U.S. global health assistance if they provide information, referrals, or services for legal abortion or advocating for access to abortion services, even with their own money. The impact has been unprecedented during the COVID-19 pandemic as clinics that once relied on U.S. aid to provide family planning services, preventative, and primary health care to underserved communities in developing nations were forced to turn down much-needed funding, and ultimately scale back their work, in the middle of a global health crisis.

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