Opinion: Biden administration has room for growth on reproductive rights

At the United Nations General Assembly last month, U.S. President Joe Biden referred to the work of the U.N. as “an act of dauntless hope.” I get that. I also have hope, and I keep hoping for more. I have been encouraged by recent remarkable progress in terms of sexual and reproductive health and rights — or SRHR — and global health policy. Given the U.S. is the largest donor to global health programs in the world, its actions on SRHR and protecting the right to abortion globally need to be impeccable — straight A grades.

In 2015, the Obama administration first officially recognized sexual rights. Six years later, when the Biden administration arrived at the White House in January 2021, they stated that it would be their policy to “support women’s and girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights in the United States, as well as globally."

The Biden administration's avowed commitment to SRHR is a complete 180 from the stance of the previous administration.

To understand just how much changed once the Biden administration came into power, our team of researchers at Fòs Feminista is continuing to work on the SRHR Index, a resource first launched in 2018, that grades the U.S. government’s commitments to SRHR as demonstrated through policies, funding decisions, and other actions related to U.S. global health assistance.

The team analyzed publicly available data released by the U.S. government in calendar years 2020 and 2021 to encompass the final year of the Trump administration and the first year of the Biden administration.

Unsurprisingly, the whole of the U.S. government's grade increased from C- in 2020 to a C+ in 2021. One of the reasons for this is because the White House, which like all actors receives an individual grade, saw its grade skyrocket from a D to a B-.

These changes, captured at a crucial inflection point, reflect both the Trump administration’s clear opposition to SRHR and the Biden administration’s vocal commitment to protecting and advancing SRHR globally that is backed up by action. These included the immediate revocation of the “global gag rule,” which prohibits foreign NGOs who receive U.S. global health assistance from providing legal abortion services or referrals, and removal of the U.S. from the Geneva Consensus Declaration, which claims that there is no international right to abortion.

But here is what might be surprising: Not all grades rose from 2020 to 2021. The 2021 SRHR Index grades show that it will take time for the White House’s commitment to SRHR to trickle down to the U.S. government agencies responsible for implementing U.S. global health programs and for those agencies to operate as expansively as possible within the administration’s positive stance on SRHR. Regressive policies implemented with the mere stroke of a pen can often take years for agencies to undo. The Trump administration not only undid years of progress, but set the U.S. and the globe backward.

For example, some U.S. global health agencies didn’t provide sufficient information for partners to end the implementation of the global gag rule after Biden revoked the policy in January 2021, leading to its needlessly prolonged implementation. Others demonstrated a lack of funding transparency or failed to spend available global health funds in countries demonstrating the highest need.

While we can and should applaud progress when we see it, we cannot settle for a White House that scores a B- and a government that scores a C+ on issues fundamental to the health, safety, and dignity of communities around the world. There is so much more that needs to be done.

Permanently repealing the Helms Amendment, which has been used to ban foreign assistance from funding abortion services, as well as the global gag rule — instead of just revoking it, which means any president can later bring it back — are two key actions the U.S. government could take immediately to promote SRHR globally, which would be reflected in improved SRHR Index grades in the next grading cycle.

As the world’s largest global health programs donor, actions taken by the U.S. government can cause ripple effects across the world. And, as we have seen clearly in the months following the Dobbs v. Jackson U.S. Supreme Court decision, the world is watching.

One way to demonstrate that the U.S. government will protect and promote SRHR within the U.S. and around the world is for U.S. government actors, including the Biden administration, to do absolutely everything in their power to preserve the right to abortion in an act of reassurance to our partners, allies, and neighbors.

U.S. government leaders with the privilege of power must reliably score straight-A grades on their commitments to sexual and reproductive health and rights moving forward. We can’t afford to simply undo the harm incurred from past government actions while stopping short of making meaningful and long-lasting progress. We can no longer settle for short-term solutions that leave the world vulnerable to policies that strip away hard-won human rights.

As shown in the latest SRHR Index grades, there has been progress, and year after year we will continue to demand more from the government. We will continue to have dauntless hope. But it’s time to demand better of our elected officials, and the SRHR Index helps us collectively define what true progress looks like.