After Overturning Roe, Trump’s Justices Allow States To Defund Planned Parenthood–And They Aren’t Stopping There
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Thursday, June 26, 2025
PRESS CONTACT:
WASHINGTON — In the ten years since he entered politics, Donald Trump and his MAGA Republican allies have taken a wrecking ball to Americans’ reproductive rights and freedoms. Thanks to Trump’s extreme judicial appointees, Roe v. Wade was overturned three years ago this week, decimating reproductive access and, for the first time in our nation’s history, the Supreme Court ripped away a constitutional right from the American people.
But Trump’s judges didn’t stop there. This morning, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to allow states to defund Planned Parenthood, effectively ending access to Planned Parenthood clinics for Medicaid recipients in anti-choice states. As Justice Jackson says in her dissent, “Concretely, [this ruling] will strip those South Carolinians—and countless other Medicaid recipients around the country—of a deeply personal freedom…[it] is likely to result in tangible harm to real people.”
Time and time again extremists have made it harder for women across this nation to access their fundamental rights. The far-right even attempted to overturn the FDA’s approval of Mifepristone–a medication that has been used safely and effectively for two decades in abortion care. Now, Trump and his Republican allies in Congress are barreling ahead with new judicial nominees who will dutifully enact this extreme, unpopular agenda and rip reproductive healthcare away from the American people.
Here is an overview of how Trump and extremist MAGA judges are waging a war on reproductive freedoms:
- Trump’s three Supreme Court Justices – Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett – played a critical role in overturning decades of judicial precedent to kill Roe v. Wade. Afterwards, Trump took full credit for the decision.
- In 2022, Trump-appointed Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of Texas ruled that Title X, which ensures access to publicly funded family planning services, violated parents’ rights under Texas law.
- Then, in 2023, Judge Kacsmaryk also suspended the approval of the abortion drug Mifepristone, attempting to kill a 20-year precedent and unilaterally remove a drug from the market against the FDA’s objections. The ruling was based in part on two “studies” that were later retracted due to “conflicts of interest by the authors and flaws in their research.”
Now, Trump and MAGA Republicans want to go even further, attempting to stack our courts with nominees who have extreme records on abortion.
- Whitney Hermandorfer: Trump’s nominee for a seat on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, Whitney Hermandorfer, has a history of arguing for extreme anti-abortion positions in court, like avoiding clarifying exceptions to an abortion ban and challenging rules that federally funded medical facilities must provide information on abortion when requested by a patient.
- Josh Devine: Trump’s nominee for Missouri’s Eastern and Western District Courts, Josh Divine, most recently Missouri’s Solicitor General, and the office he led frequently defended the state’s efforts to oppose abortion rights in court. Divine even worked to neutralize the results of Missouri’s voter-approved Amendment 3, which overturned the state’s abortion ban. Divine argued that a series of “TRAP” laws – measures designed to make abortion inaccessible – were not impacted by the new Constitutional amendment. Divine is also an attorney in Missouri’s effort to undo the FDA’s approval of Mifepristone.
- Chad Meredith: Nominated to the Eastern District of Kentucky, Chad Meredith has a proven record of anti-abortion work, especially in his role as Solicitor General of Kentucky. Meredith defended in court Kentucky’s anti-choice mandatory ultrasound law, which targeted abortion providers and would have closed down the state’s single abortion clinic, effectively ending access in the state.
- Maria Lanahan: In her role as Principal Deputy Solicitor General in Missouri, Lanahan has represented the state of Missouri as the state has attempted to undo the FDA’s approval of Mifepristone. Lanahan also defended Missouri’s abortion ban in a lawsuit filed by religious leaders who support abortion rights.
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