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‘DANGEROUS AND CRUEL’: TRUMP VA QUIETLY BANS ABORTION EVEN FOR
RAPE AND HEALTH RISKS  
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Jessica Corbett
December 23, 2025
Common Dreams
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_ “This decision endangers the health, lives, and futures of the
people who have served our country—and it proves what we’ve long
warned: Trump and his allies won’t stop until they’ve imposed a
national abortion ban. _

The Tibor Rubin Veteran Affairs Medical Center in Long Beach,
California is shown on, July 31, 2019., Scott Varley/MediaNews
Group/Torrance Daily Breeze via Getty Image

 

Defenders of reproductive rights
[[link removed]] on Tuesday
responded with alarm after President Donald Trump’s administration
quietly imposed
[[link removed]] an abortion
[[link removed]] ban at the US Department
of Veterans [[link removed]] Affairs
following a legal opinion penned
[[link removed]] by a deputy
assistant attorney general.

After the 2022 _Roe v. Wade_
[[link removed]] reversal, the Biden
administration [[link removed]]
allowed
[[link removed]]
the VA to provide abortion counseling and care for service members and
beneficiaries in cases of rape, incest, or if the pregnancy threatened
the health of the patient. Once Trump returned to power, the
department proposed
[[link removed]] a rule
that would end those exceptions—though the VA would continue
treating ectopic pregnancies and miscarriages, and allow abortions
“when a physician certifies that the life of the mother would be
endangered if the fetus were carried to term.”

Although that rule hasn’t taken effect, the US Department of Justice
[[link removed]] last week
issued a memo in which Joshua Craddock of the Office of Legal Counsel
concludes that the 2022 policy wasn’t legally valid. The VA on
Monday issued its own internal
[[link removed]]
memo
[[link removed]]—obtained
by the legal group Democracy Forward [[link removed]]
and reported by _MS NOW_—announcing immediate compliance with the
DOJ’s opinion, effectively implementing the proposed rule without
finishing the formal process for doing so.

“DOJ’s opinion states that VA is not legally authorized to provide
abortions, and VA is complying with it immediately,” Pete
Kasperowicz, press secretary for the VA, confirmed to _MS NOW_,
without answering further questions. “DOJ’s opinion is consistent
with VA’s proposed rule,
[[link removed]]
which continues to work its way through the regulatory process.”

Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy
[[link removed]] Forward, said
[[link removed]]
in a statement that “denying veterans essential healthcare
[[link removed]] and abortion
access—even in cases of rape or serious health risk—after they
have sacrificed so much for our country is callous and inhumane.”

Democracy Forward represented Minority Veterans of America in
submitting a comment
[[link removed]]
opposing the proposed rule, and Perryman pledged that “we will
continue to fight its implementation now that it has been
finalized.”

“This abortion ban makes it clear that the Trump administration
[[link removed]] will always
choose its dangerous political agenda, even if the cost is veterans
and their families’ access to essential care.”

Minority Veterans of America co-founder and executive director Lindsay
Church also denounced the “dangerous and cruel” policy shift.

“Veterans face unique challenges that make it critical for us to be
able to access abortion care, including possible exposure to toxic
chemicals, waiting to start a family until after our service, and
experiencing sexual assault
[[link removed]],” she said.
“Abortion should not be a political issue—it is necessary,
life-saving medical care, and denying this care will put veterans and
their loved ones’ lives in danger.”

Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women’s Law
Center, warned
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that “the Trump administration is confirming what we’ve always
known: its promise to leave abortion to the states was a lie. No one
is safe from their anti-abortion crusade, not even our nation’s
veterans.”

Goss Graves called on federal lawmakers to “pass legislation to
reverse this harmful new policy and reinstate abortion access to all
veterans and their loved ones who depend on the VA for care,” though
such a bill is unlikely to advance in the current
Republican-controlled Congress.

Reproductive Freedom for All president and CEO Mini Timmaraju
similarly declared
[[link removed]]
that “this decision endangers the health, lives, and futures of the
people who have served our country—and it proves what we’ve long
warned: Trump and his allies won’t stop until they’ve imposed a
national abortion ban.”

Nancy Northup, president and CEO at the Center for Reproductive
Rights, argued
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that “everyone should be appalled by this heartless policy.
President Trump said he would leave abortion to the states, but he
continues to seize new opportunities to restrict it nationally.”

 
Planned Parenthood Federation of America highlighted that “this ban
goes into effect as the Trump administration and its allies in
Congress continue a full-scale attack on access to sexual and
reproductive health: stripping veterans of essential healthcare,
slashing Medicaid [[link removed]], and
‘defunding’ Planned Parenthood.”

Alexis McGill Johnson, the group’s president and CEO, said
[[link removed]]
that “this abortion ban makes it clear that the Trump administration
will always choose its dangerous political agenda, even if the cost is
veterans and their families’ access to essential care.”

Earlier this year, House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Ranking
Member Mark Takano (D-Calif.) and Senate Committee on Veterans’
Affairs Ranking Member Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) led
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over 230 of their colleagues in submitting a public comment against
the Trump administration’s proposed rule. Takano and other members
of the House panel also spoke out
[[link removed]]
on Tuesday.

“As a country, we made a solemn promise to honor veterans’ service
and ensure they receive the healthcare they have earned. Veterans
should be able to trust that promise and know they can walk into a VA
medical center and receive the care they need,” said Takano.
“Instead of trusting veterans to make the healthcare decisions that
are best for them, VA is allowing political opinion to supplant its
duty to veterans.”

“Instead of allowing veterans to discuss all their healthcare
options openly and honestly with their providers, VA has decided that
the government should be in charge of making healthcare decisions,
even in matters of life and death,” he continued. “And instead of
fulfilling its duty to provide needed healthcare to veterans, VA has
refused to acknowledge the unique and complex healthcare needs of
veterans who are more likely to have complex health conditions that
can increase the risks associated with pregnancy. Veterans fought for
our rights. Now it’s our responsibility to fight for theirs.”

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Jessica Corbett is a senior editor and staff writer for Common Dreams.

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