The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) under the Trump administration is reversing a regulatory policy from Joe Biden’s presidency that allowed the department’s medical system to perform abortions for veterans.
Issued in September of 2022 — months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, allowing states to regulate abortion in the first and second trimesters of pregnancy — the original policy created exceptions to the VA’s general prohibition on providing abortions to patients. The department is now rescinding that rule change, reverting to pre-Biden policy on abortion.
Republicans had maintained that the Biden-era rule was illegal, as it exceeded the medical benefits package that the VA could provide to veterans under federal law. Although the VA is authorized to perform “general reproductive care,” it is precluded by law from providing “infertility services [and] abortions” unless related to a pregnancy with “risks of complication [that] are increased by a service-connected condition.”
In a 2022 memo to Senator Steve Daines (R., Mont.), the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service concluded that the Biden administration’s rule allowing the VA to perform abortion was likely illegal. Because the Veterans Health Care Act of 1993 “appears to statutorily restrict the VA from covering abortion services, it seems unlikely that a court would uphold regulations that had been revised to allow the VA to make such services available,” it found.
Explaining its reversal of the rule, VA leadership said that “it is without question that VA has the authority to bar provision of abortion services through the VA medical benefits package to veterans.” The department also noted that the initial policy change was made explicitly in response to the 2022 Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
“Prior to the Biden administration’s politically motivated change in 2022, federal law and longstanding precedent across Democrat and Republican administrations prevented VA from providing abortions and abortion counseling,” a VA spokesperson said. “VA’s proposed rule will reinstate the pre-Biden bipartisan policy, bringing the department back in line with historical norms.”
In 2022, the VA justified the rule allowing it to perform abortions in cases of medical necessity. It had determined that abortions were “needed” when “the life or health of the pregnant veteran would be endangered if the pregnancy were carried to term or when the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest. Unless VA removes its existing prohibitions on abortion-related care and makes clear that needed abortion-related care is authorized, these veterans will face serious threats to their life and health.”
In rescinding that determination, the VA now argues that it is fully returning abortion policy to the states, where it properly belongs. It says that the Biden-era rule created a “purported federal entitlement to abortion for veterans where none had existed before, and without regard to state law.”
The pro-life organization Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America celebrated the VA’s reversal. It said in a statement, “We thank President Trump and VA Secretary Collins for restoring the rule of law and ending the Biden Administration’s illegal policy that forced taxpayers to fund abortions through VA hospitals and violated state pro-life laws.”
“Instead of prioritizing the real and urgent needs of our veterans, the Biden-Harris Administration turned VA hospitals into abortion centers — violating longstanding law and betraying the will of the American people who strongly oppose forced taxpayer-funded abortions. Veterans deserve compassionate care and healing and should not be subjected to the violence of abortion.”
Dozens of congressional Republicans had pushed to nullify the VA rule under Biden in 2023, through a resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review Act. Lacking control of the Senate and White House at the time, however, their effort was unsuccessful.
Senator James Lankford, a leading proponent of the resolution of disapproval, commended the Trump administration for rescinding the rule. “The Biden administration’s abortion rule at the VA broke long-standing federal law and should have never been implemented in the first place,” Lankford said.
“Reversing it sends a clear message: Government should protect life, not take it, and under President Trump, the mission of the VA is to serve veterans with dignity and care — not advance a political agenda.”