US government website on reproductive rights goes offline as Trump takes office
Donald Trump has taken office for his second non-consecutive term as the 47th president of the United States. (Chip Somodevilla/Pool/ AFP)
A US government website on reproductive rights has gone offline following Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
Trump, who was sworn into office on Monday (20 January), used his inaugural address to state that there are only two genders, male and female, and vowed to end “the government policy of trying to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life”.
During his previous administration, between 2017 and 2021, Trump appointed three justices to the US Supreme Court who voted to overturn the landmark pro-abortion ruling in Roe vs Wade, leaving individual states to decide their own laws.
Twelve states now have total abortion bans, and 29 have laws based on gestational times, according to research and policy organisation the Guttmacher Institute.
The government website, reproductiverights.gov, launched by the Department of Health and Human Services in 2022 and active as recently as 15 January, went offline on the evening of Trump’s inauguration, CBS News reported.
The site shared information “including access to birth control and safe and legal abortion care, an essential part of health and well-being”, and advising that since “Roe vs Wade was overturned, abortion remains legal in many states [while] other reproductive healthcare services remain protected by law”.
The site also provided information on the Affordable Care Act – which Trump seemingly plans to repeal – and provided a list of services covered by insurers.
In an interview in April, Trump said he would not interfere in local decisions on abortion, even if states monitored pregnancies and prosecuted those who violated bans.
This would effectively reinforce abortion as a criminal offence rather than a healthcare issue between a person and their doctor.
During the interview with Time magazine, Trump, who was pro-choice 25 years ago, declined to commit to a veto on federal abortion restrictions if they were proposed in his second term. “I’m leaving everything up to the states,” he said. “I don’t have to do anything about vetoes because we now have [the decision to outlaw abortion].”
Share your thoughts! Let us know in the comments below, and remember to keep the conversation respectful.
How did this story make you feel?
