Pregnant women Cameroon Pers-Anders Pettersson/Getty Images

Donald Trump’s Little Women

US President Donald Trump’s “global gag rule” restricts any foreign organization that receives US aid funds from providing abortion services to women – even just information or referrals. Trump seems to be following through on his earlier suggestion that women who have abortions should be "punished."


NEW YORK – A non-profit women’s health organization in Kenya is confronting an impossible dilemma. Kisumu Medical and Education Trust receives $200,000 per year from the United States government to train doctors to treat postpartum hemorrhaging. KMET also receives money from European donors and other sources to provide comprehensive reproductive health services, including abortion counseling. After US President Donald Trump’s recent executive order reinstating and expanding the so-called “global gag rule,” KMET – and many more organizations like it – will have to choose between life-saving programs.

The global gag rule, officially known as the Mexico City policy, prevents official US funding for development aid from going to non-US organizations that provide any kind of abortion services to women – even information or referrals – regardless of how those services are financed. Organizations that advocate expanded abortion access in their own countries are also barred from US funding.

https://prosyn.org/cFQ015u