“I don’t know,” admitted Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “The reply to that’s I don’t know.”
The could-be secretary of Well being and Human Providers was responding to a considerably procedural—however essential—query throughout his first affirmation listening to: whether or not federal legislation ensures {that a} pregnant particular person has a proper to emergency care if they’re experiencing life-threatening bleeding from an incomplete miscarriage. The reply is that almost all hospitals should certainly present such companies, even in a state with an abortion ban.
However that was misplaced on Kennedy Wednesday as he was being grilled by Nevada senator Catherine Cortez Masto—simply one among a number of moments by which the nominee was clearly treading water.
Day two was simply as strained. When Senator Tammy Baldwin requested if Kennedy would decide to maintaining Mifepristone—the FDA-approved abortion tablet that knowledge has proven is less dangerous than penicillin and Viagra—available on the market as a result of it’s secure and efficient, he faltered, saying he wanted to evaluation the information and that he would comply with President Donald Trump’s steering. “I’m going to—with Mifeprisone, President Trump has not chosen a coverage and I’ll implement his coverage,” Kennedy mentioned.
“So whatever the research, whatever the knowledge, whatever the science,” Baldwin pressed on, “you’ll have that coverage no matter what the science says?”
“I want these particulars,” Kennedy repeated.
Whereas a lot of the hearings targeted on Kennedy’s anti-vaccine statements from the previous, varied senators questioned him on abortion—loads. Democrats requested whether or not he would disrupt entry to abortion treatment, whereas Republicans anxious that he wasn’t antiabortion sufficient. In the long run, although, Kennedy’s solutions seemingly had much less to do with no matter he thinks about reproductive well being care and extra to do with interesting to his potential boss.
On Title X—which offers sources for contraception and different reproductive well being care, however isn’t allowed to fund abortion—Kennedy mentioned he would comply with no matter Trump determined. “I’m going to assist President Trump’s insurance policies on Title X,” Kennedy advised Senator James Lankford, a Republican from Oklahoma. “I agree with President Trump that each abortion is a tragedy.”
When Trump was in workplace, in 2019 his administration implemented a brand new rule that barred any supplier within the Title X community from offering or referring sufferers for abortion care, main Deliberate Parenthood and all Title X clinics in six states to drop out of the Title X community that yr, in line with the Guttmacher Institute. That transfer ended with greater than 1,000 clinics across the nation withdrawing from this system, stopping scores of People from receiving care.
However this time period, a Kennedy-led HHS may take Trump’s antiabortion agenda even additional: Kennedy may, as an illustration, pursue challenges to abortion treatment. He additionally may additionally affect how nationwide legal guidelines are enforced when individuals expertise being pregnant problems, want emergency care associated to miscarriage, or hunt down abortion in a country where one in 4 girls of reproductive age can have an abortion by age 45.
Throughout his reelection marketing campaign, Trump consistently shifted his rhetoric on abortion—concurrently bragging about appointing the justices who ended Roe v. Wade whereas claiming that he can be the “protector” of all girls, “whether or not [they] prefer it or not.” It was a exact and intentional dance: Hold his antiabortion base glad with out alienating the vast majority of People who believe abortion ought to be authorized in all or most circumstances.
However as soon as he was sworn in to workplace, Trump dropped the pretense. Inside hours, reproductiverights.gov, a authorities web site that provided steering on contraception and emergency abortions, went darkish. The president additionally restored US participation within the Mexico Metropolis Coverage, an antiabortion settlement that cuts off family-planning funds for international nongovernmental organizations if they supply or promote abortions. Maybe most notably, Trump signed an government order requiring the enforcement of the Hyde Modification, which restricts authorities funding for abortion companies, like for individuals enrolled in Medicaid and Medicare.
