{"id":602,"date":"2026-05-16T02:27:54","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T02:27:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/?p=602"},"modified":"2026-05-16T02:27:54","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T02:27:54","slug":"trump-administration-sued-by-veterans-group-over-va-abortion-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/?p=602","title":{"rendered":"Trump administration sued by veterans group over VA abortion ban"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A veterans advocacy group is suing the Trump administration over its ban on abortion care and counseling at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).<\/p>\n

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The Minority Veterans of America said it brought the lawsuit on behalf of all its members harmed by the ban, including one pregnant member who has chronic medical conditions and a long history of pregnancy complications and needs access to abortion care and counseling to protect her health.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0lawsuit\u00a0was filed<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit argues that the Trump\u00a0administration\u00a0violated the Administrative Procedures Act when the VA\u00a0revoked a Biden-era legal opinion that allowed the VA to provide limited abortion counseling and services to pregnant veterans and their beneficiaries,\u00a0including those who become pregnant as a result of rape or incest.<\/p>\n

According to the complaint,\u00a0the\u00a0\u201cVA\u00a0failed to\u00a0provide any explanation\u2014let alone a reasoned explanation\u2014for disregarding its\u00a0previous\u00a0factual findings addressing veterans\u2019 need for abortion care, and\u00a0\u2026 failed to\u00a0address significant comments.\u201d<\/p>\n

The\u00a02022\u00a0Biden\u00a0<\/a><\/span>administration policy allowed abortions for those who became pregnant\u00a0as a result of\u00a0rape or incest or if a pregnancy endangered the \u201clife and health\u201d of the person seeking an abortion.\u00a0The\u00a0VA did not cover abortions before 2022.<\/p>\n

The VA in December\u00a0quietly reimplemented<\/a>\u00a0the ban following a memo authored by Joshua Craddock, deputy assistant attorney general of the Department of Justice\u2019s Office of Legal Counsel, issued Dec. 18 that concluded the VA may not provide abortion services under any provision of the law.<\/p>\n

The VA abortion ban applies across all states, regardless of the state\u2019s abortion access laws.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u00a0wish\u00a0I felt excited about this pregnancy, but instead I feel terrified,\u201d the anonymous service member being represented\u00a0in the lawsuit said in a statement\u00a0provided by the National Women\u2019s Law Center, whose lawyers are serving as co-counsel in the case along with attorneys from the legal advocacy group Democracy Forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cVA\u2019s ban on abortion care and counseling is a direct threat to my health and my ability to parent my existing children and a betrayal of the sacrifices I have made for my country,\u201d\u00a0the service member said.<\/p>\n

According to the complaint, the veteran had not intended to become pregnant and had recently been advised by one of her doctors that she likely did not have the capacity to become pregnant naturally.<\/p>\n

Her first-trimester\u00a0pregnancy is\u00a0\u201calready\u00a0exacerbating existing health conditions,\u201d the complaint\u00a0stated,\u00a0and \u201cthere is a substantial risk\u201d she will need to\u00a0terminate\u00a0her pregnancy to\u00a0preserve\u00a0her health.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A veterans advocacy group is suing the Trump administration over its ban on abortion care and counseling at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).   The Minority Veterans of America…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=602"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":603,"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602\/revisions\/603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanitystories.pics\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}