AJWS SALUTES CONGRESSIONAL EFFORTS TO KEEP GLOBAL GAG EXPANSION FROM ERASING DECADES OF PUBLIC HEALTH PROGRESS  

New York (April 29, 2026) — American Jewish World Service (AJWS) hails the introduction of bicameral legislation to halt the implementation of the expanded Global Gag rules. The Protecting Human Rights and Public Health in Foreign Assistance Act would prohibit the Trump administration latest expansion, an effort deceptively labeled “Promoting Human Flourishing in Foreign Assistance,” from going into effect. AJWS applauds Senators Shaheen and Rosen and Representatives Meeks and Frankel for putting people’s needs at the center of U.S. foreign policy with this legislation. 

Republican administrations have wielded Global Gag, also known as the Mexico City Policy, to hamper reproductive health services around the world. Beginning with the Reagan administration, it has barred foreign NGOs that receive U.S. foreign assistance for family planning from providing counseling on or even talking about abortion, even using their own money. In 2017, the policy was expanded to include all funding for global health assistance. The latest expansion, announced in January, extends these legacy restrictions beyond comprehensive reproductive care, blocking virtually all U.S. foreign assistance from reaching communities in need. 

The new rules weaponize U.S. resources by restricting funding of services, activities, advocacy, and speech related to “gender ideology” as well as any initiative the Trump administration characterizes as diversity, equity, and inclusion programming. Even more damaging, Global Gag now covers all non-military U.S. foreign assistance and applies to all entities delivering aid, including American and foreign NGOs, other governments, and the UN and multilateral organizations. Attaching such vague restrictions to U.S. foreign assistance makes it impossible for most entities to accept funds to distribute humanitarian assistance, provide clean water and sanitation, build schools and hospitals, or promote human rights as means to escape poverty.   

“If the administration seeks to promote ‘human flourishing,’ it must make evidence-based funding decisions,” said Tawanda Mutasah, AJWS’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “We should be deploying resources on programs that work to improve the health, safety, and wellbeing of people worldwide. The new Global Gag rule renders billions in taxpayer-supported dollars useless in the fight against poverty, disease, and inequality. By subjecting all foreign assistance funding and partners to an ideological litmus test, Global Gag worsens global health, increases security risks, and deepens inequity.” 

Taken in totality, these rules will be the end of effective U.S. foreign assistance for billions of vulnerable people, in particular communities that AJWS supports, especially LGBTQI+ people, women and girls, and ethnic minorities. 

“Playing politics with human life, the administration’s Global Gag expansion will reverse decades of public health and development progress,” said Mutasah. “We urge Congress to pass legislation that will prevent this immoral expansion from being implemented.”