Under President-elect Trump, access to medical abortion pills may be restricted.
Charlie Neighborgal/Associated Press
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Charlie Neighborgal/Associated Press
Last Wednesday morning, as millions of Americans woke up to learn that Donald Trump had been elected president, Dr. Angel Foster realized she was about to get very busy.
Foster is the co-founder of the Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project (MAP), a telemedicine provider that sends abortion pills by mail to patients across the country, including states where abortion is illegal.
Typically, 130 to 140 people fill out the organization’s registration form, Foster said, but more than 1,000 people filled it out the day after the presidential election.
“The last few days have been extremely difficult for our team,” Foster said, noting that many of these patients are not pregnant and are instead purchasing the drug for future use. He added that there is.
MAP is one of several telemedicine abortion providers that are inundated with requests. Last week, Aid Access, Hey Jane, and Wisp all told NPR that they were seeing a spike in orders for abortion pills.
President-elect Trump promised that veto the federal abortion banhe can still exercise executive power to restrict access. And since the majority of abortions in the United States are performed with a two-pill prescription that essentially causes a miscarriage, any effort to restrict abortion care is likely to target these drugs.
Given what happened during the first Trump administration, it’s understandable that people are afraid now, said Brittany Fontenot, president of the National Abortion Federation.
“We can expect a second Trump administration to emerge without guardrails, without government protection. Roe vs. Wade — potentially even more devastating for abortion rights and access,” Fontenot said.
For example, President Trump could ban telemedicine abortions. Or it could place restrictions on prescribing or mailing abortion pills. The Supreme Court is dominated by conservatives, making regulatory changes more likely to overcome legal challenges.
During his last presidential term, Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices, including one to fill the vacancy of the late abortion rights advocate Ruth Bader Ginsburg. This led to the overthrow Roe vs. Wade And in 2022, it abolished the constitutional right to abortion.
Changes to federal abortion policy would likely be made through the Department of Justice or the Department of Health and Human Services. President Trump’s choices to lead these departments include conflicting positions on abortion.
President Trump has announced that he will nominate Florida Representative Matt Gaetz to be the next attorney general. Gates is against abortion. If confirmed, he would decide how to enforce laws including the Comstock Act, a dormant obscenity law from the 1800s that could be used to ban abortions across the country.
In contrast, President Trump wants Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a supporter of abortion rights, to head the Department of Health and Human Services. The department oversees the Food and Drug Administration and controls rules regarding abortion drugs, including whether the pills can be mailed or prescribed via telemedicine.
The issue is especially important because the Biden administration has relaxed rules on prescribing and dispensing abortion pills and expanded access to telemedicine. This policy change particularly benefited people in communities that lacked access to abortion care. In fact, nearly one in five abortions in the United States is performed via telemedicine.
According to , between 2020 and 2023, the number of abortions in the United States increased by 11%. Guttmacher Institutea think tank that supports abortion rights.
Anti-abortion groups see this expansion as a major threat to their goals.
“The pro-life movement has a lot of work ahead of us,” said Kelsey Pritchard of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, a powerful anti-abortion lobby. The group said it is focused on dismantling the policies of the Biden-Harris administration.
America’s Lifelong Students legislative agenda This includes passing state and federal laws restricting access to abortion drugs, known as chemical abortions. They say they have support from many state legislators as well as many Republicans.
The Trump administration has a number of tools in place to restrict access to abortion, but the president-elect has not said exactly what he will do or when. Legal experts say it is also unclear how challenges to new regulations and laws will play out in court.
Meanwhile, patients are making plans for a new era.
In addition to the increased demand for abortion pills, Hey Jane and Wisp also report a surge in demand for emergency contraception, which prevents sperm from fertilizing eggs. Something similar happened after that egg Wisp CEO Monica Cepak recalls.
“I think in moments like these, women feel a growing call to take ownership and take more ownership over their own health,” Sepak says.
