Rubio: UN has 'lost its purpose' by pushing abortion and contraception

(C-Fam, Washington, D.C.) In congressional testimony this month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the UN has “lost its purpose” and “lost its mission.” Appearing at a hearing on the Trump administration’s 2027 foreign affairs budget, Secretary Rubio criticized international institutions that have long dominated global health and which have spent hundreds of millions of dollars overseas to promote UN-style family planning and abortion advocacy. A major shift is underway in how the US spends taxpayer dollars, and it is having direct implications on global health funding.

For many years, it has been nearly impossible to separate family planning from abortion in foreign aid. Trump’s America First agenda prohibits that funding and redirects US foreign policy toward domestic security and national interests. For example, 2027 saw a significant decline in global health funding from $9.4 to $5.1 billion.

Representative Grace Meng (D-NY) was critical of this shift in priorities. Specifically, she highlighted the Trump Administration’s disruption of millions of dollars that flow to overseas abortion groups through family planning aid. Meng claimed the Trump Administration is “attacking women” because of its resistance to distribute $10 million worth of contraceptives that are currently in a Belgian warehouse. Rubio replied that the “government of the United States is not going to be involved in distributing contraceptives and all these other things around the world.”

The Trump administration’s agenda seeks to optimize health, especially for women, by improving healthcare infrastructure across the world and transitioning recipient countries to self-reliance. Rubio said that almost every foreign aid program “involves more women, girls and children than they do adult males because of the nature of the aid that we’re providing.”

In that same exchange, Meng argued that this is a significant shift from the past and that a new plan is needed....

Read the entire article at C-Fam.