Five Key Moments in the Attack on the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.
Twelve months prior, organisations advocating for women's rights were anticipating a return of Donald Trump to office. Few were prepared for. The volume and speed of White House mandates originating in the White House were interpreted as a intentional maneuver to cause confusion and fear. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as organisations scrambled to compensate for the loss left by a major funding freeze. But this merely marked the opening act.
The American government has been the main instigator, bolstered by vigorous campaigning by religious fundamentalist networks exploiting the situation to build worldwide connections with sympathetic regimes.
The anti-rights movement denotes an international coalition of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as affluent financiers and clans that work to dismantle gains in a variety of areas. This covers abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They pursue this agenda via advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We examine five junctures that shaped the security, respect, and well-being of girls and women.
The Dismantling of USAID
In March, shortly after a key American development organization is suspended, causing international chaos, a leading figure in the administration states that nearly all of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. US diplomats, past leaders and humanitarian and health experts denounce the action, cautioning that lives will be lost. Activists say that the closure of the organization is not just a financial shortfall, it is a savage attack on human rights and birth control and maternal healthcare. Many organisations say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by diminishing aid, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, evidence indicates how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Another pair of leading funders announce their own austerity measures. A leader of an international advocacy group says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is an attempt to placate a powerful partner.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a strategic summit held in parallel with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in buoyant mood as they welcome shifts in US policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the UN secretary general opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is resurgent, after a report shows that groups opposing progressive rights are systematically eroding longstanding consensus on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa centered on the traditional family and national sovereignty sparks alarm among equality campaigners. In May, a president and first lady open a major forum to push back on what they label external influences undermining local norms. A few days later, another continental gathering on conservative ethics is held. Both events are attended by leading Western campaigners against gender ideology, including heads of influential networks. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to push back against “radical global social engineering” of multilateral bodies. In the following month, a prominent church hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in the region, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has expanded considerably.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their elimination will deprive a huge female population from contraceptive supplies, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about forcing a conservative worldview globally” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials will not allow usable products to be destroyed.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Reviving the global gag rule, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the rule was reinstated in January. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. But in October, the US announces it intends to broaden the scope of the policy to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. Additional information regarding the broader enforcement are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says broadening the policy will have “unimaginable effects”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that fresh American assistance deals being negotiated with countries in Africa will become dependent on agreeing to the expanded global gag.
