Five Key Moments in the Assault on the Freedoms of Women and Girls in 2025.
Twelve months prior, organisations advocating for women's rights were anticipating a second Trump term. Few were prepared for. The sheer number and rapid pace of White House mandates coming out of the White House were seen as a calculated strategy to induce a state of shock. The tactic proved effective – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as networks struggled to address the shortfall left by a freeze on international development funds. But this was only the precursor.
The US administration has been the main instigator, complemented by intense advocacy work by far-right organisations exploiting the situation to strengthen global ties with ideological partners.
This opposition to progressive rights denotes an international coalition of policymakers, doctrinal establishments, and activist outfits as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that seek to undermine progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This encompasses 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 push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We look at five instances that influenced the protection, honor, and existence of women and girls.
The Demise of a Major Aid Agency
In early spring, a month and a half following a major US aid agency is halted, causing widespread distress, a top American diplomat announces that nearly all of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. Career diplomats, past leaders and relief and public health authorities condemn the news, warning that people will die as a result. Rights defenders say that the demise of the agency is not just a financial shortfall, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and birth control and maternal healthcare. A multitude of agencies say females will bear the brunt by diminishing aid, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, statistics reveal how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with many more millions at risk. Two other major donor nations announce their own austerity measures. A director of a global justice organization says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a strategic summit held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in buoyant mood as they welcome changes in American foreign policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the UN secretary general opens the gender equality forum with a stark warning that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is back, after a study indicates that groups opposing progressive rights are actively undermining longstanding consensus on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa focused on the traditional family and national sovereignty triggers anxiety among rights advocates. In the start of May, a president and first lady open a significant conference to combat what they label external influences undermining local norms. A few days later, another continental gathering on family values is held. Both events are participated in by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including heads of influential networks. One speaker urges African NGOs to push back against “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of multilateral bodies. In June, a prominent church hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in an African nation, an event that health activists say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Advocates remark that the scale of their presence has expanded considerably.
Contraceptive Destruction Order
As health facilities across Africa report they are running out of contraceptives, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in midsummer plans to incinerate a vast stockpile of birth control held in a European depot. A leading family planning organization states that their destruction will deny countless females from contraceptive supplies, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “heartless and dangerous”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains unresolved as local authorities are blocking usable products to be destroyed.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Reviving the global gag rule, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the policy was restored in January. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. Further specifics about the policy's widened application are expected in early 2026. A expert in child welfare says broadening the policy will have “catastrophic impacts”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being negotiated with countries in Africa will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.
