WASHINGTON – “We gratefully applaud the decision to end taxpayer-funded abortion,” said Bishop Daniel E. Thomas of Toledo, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee for Pro-Life Activities. responding to an executive order and a memorandum issued by President Trump on Friday. The order reverses several policies of the prior Administration that promoted and facilitated abortion with taxpayer resources. The memorandum restores and expands the Mexico City Policy, which prevents taxpayer resources from going to certain organizations that perform or promote abortion overseas.
Bishop Thomas continued, “A significant majority of Americans oppose being forced to support abortion through their tax dollars. I am grateful for the strengthening of policies that protect us from being compelled to participate in a culture of death, and that help us to restore a culture of life at home and abroad.”
The same day, the United States announced rejoining the Geneva Consensus Declaration, an international statement to strengthen women’s health, the right to life for the preborn, and the role of the family. Bishop Thomas observed, “It is important and encouraging to see the United States again taking leadership in affirming the right to life and fundamental place of the family on the global stage where many pressures can be arrayed against these values.” Reflecting on pardons issued for pro-life activists earlier in the week, he further added, “Pro-life Americans have a right to pray in public, to counsel women who are considering abortion, and to peacefully protest. We welcome support for men and women who are exercising these rights to witness to a culture of life, and, at the same time, we absolutely reject resorting to force or violence.”
A recently released Marist Poll found that 57% of respondents oppose taxpayer funding of abortion, and 73% oppose taxpayer funding of abortion abroad.
The Mexico City Policy was first adopted in 1984 and has been consistently supported by the USCCB. As expanded in 2019 and renamed the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance policy (PLGHA) at the time, it prevents U.S. foreign health assistance from funding foreign, non-governmental organizations that perform or promote abortion abroad.
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