Bodily Autonomy Under Attack: The Global Fallout of Trump’s First Week in Office
28 January 2025 l In its first week in office, the Trump Administration has launched a calculated, relentless assault on the rights, health, and dignity of adolescent girls, women, and marginalized communities worldwide. These ideologically driven acts — fueled by hate and fear — endanger lives, intensify inequality, and erase the voices of those most affected.
The scale and speed of the Trump Administration’s first-week actions are shocking. Freezing nearly all foreign aid, withdrawing from the World Health Organization, and abandoning the Paris Agreement demonstrate a staggering contempt for global health, human rights, and the climate crisis. They also happened so abruptly in Trump’s first few days in office that other countries had no time to prepare and potentially mitigate the impacts. The speed of the Trump Administration’s actions also lays bare their nefarious intentions for the next four years.
The United States also has an outsized and frankly overwhelming influence on the global stage. As the largest single donor of overseas development assistance, its funding decisions and policies — like its rapid reinstatement of the Global Gag Rule — have a direct impact on programs that receive U.S. aid and the millions of adolescent girls and women who rely on them for sexual and reproductive health (SRH) care and more. Given the power and influence the United States holds via its purse strings, the Administration’s rhetoric on issues like abortion, SRH services, and gender has a profound impact on policies created and implemented by national governments.
Finally, the Administration’s ideology and rhetoric on human rights, gender, SRH care, and more — via actions like rejoining the Geneva Consensus and a so-called “Defending Women” executive order — are part of a terrifying global trend. Politicians worldwide are implementing similarly harmful policies. The Trump Administration is just one example, but one with incredible power and weight in the global arena. Politicians and leaders in other countries who share Trump’s views will now feel safer, more emboldened to act on their impulses. The world’s adolescent girls, women, and gender-diverse people will feel the compounded weight of U.S. and national-level policies on their health and lives.
Women Deliver stands with the millions whose health, rights, and futures are under attack and the activists fighting against these shameful policies worldwide. The Trump Administration’s actions are not just a rollback — they are a denial of dignity, justice, and humanity. We will not stay silent. We will not stand down. And we will not stop fighting with our partners and allies for the freedom of all people to control their bodies, their health, and their lives.
For media inquiries, please contact: Kim Lufkin, Director of Communications, media@womendeliver.org.
About Women Deliver:
Women Deliver is a global advocacy organization guided by one end result: that every girl and woman exercises her rights to full bodily autonomy and health. Learn more: www.womendeliver.org.
