The Department of Veterans Affairs has reinstated a near-total ban on abortion services for veterans and their dependents after new guidance from the Justice Department concluded that the agency lacks legal authority to provide the procedure — including in cases of rape or incest.
A VA spokesperson confirmed to Military Times the restrictions took effect immediately.
“The Department of Justice’s opinion states that VA is not legally authorized to provide abortions, and VA is complying with it immediately,” VA press secretary Pete Kasperowicz said in a statement.
“The DOJ’s opinion is consistent with VA’s proposed rule, which continues to work its way through the regulatory process,” he added.
The guidance, issued in a Dec. 18 memo, restores “the full exclusion on abortions and abortion counseling from the medical benefits package,” reversing a Biden-era policy adopted in 2022.
That policy had, for the first time, allowed the VA to provide abortion counseling and, in limited circumstances, the procedure itself “when the life or health of the pregnant veteran would be endangered if the pregnancy were carried to term, or when the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest.”
The revised policy has a single exception: it will allow abortion-related care in life-threatening circumstances.
A proposed rule filed in August, when the Trump administration first moved to implement the ban, emphasized that the VA “has never understood this policy to prohibit providing care to pregnant women in life-threatening circumstances, including treatment for ectopic pregnancies or miscarriages,” and said the exception would be formally codified.
The VA operates approximately 1,380 health care facilities nationwide and serves nearly 10 million veterans each year.
Democrats criticized the decision, saying it is depriving access to health care for women veterans.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, in a Dec. 24 post on X, called the policy “a betrayal of our brave American veterans.”
Republicans, meanwhile, have previously praised the rollback, arguing that federal funds should not be used to pay for abortion services.
“It’s simple — taxpayers do not want their hard-earned money spent on paying for abortions,“ the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs said in a statement. ”And VA’s sole focus should always be providing service-connected health care and benefits to the veterans they serve.”
