MAGA Republicans are back in the White House, and Project 2025 is their guide—the right-wing plan to turn back the clock on women’s rights, remove abortion access, and force women into roles as wives and mothers in the “ideal, natural family structure.” We know an empowered female electorate is essential to democracy. That’s why day after day, we stay vigilant in our goals to dismantle patriarchy at every turn. We are watching, and we refuse to go back. This is the War on Women Report.
Since our last report…
+ President Donald Trump finally paid writer E. Jean Carroll the $5.6 million he owes her after she won her sexual abuse and defamation lawsuit against him.
+ Celebrity women are 3.5 times more likely than men to be deepfaked, according to a new report highlighting the dangers of AI for sexual violence. The 10 most-searched public figures for deepfakes are women, with YouTuber Pokimane the most searched for and Taylor Swift and Scarlett Johansson ranking second and third, respectively.
+ Women with early-stage breast cancer could lose Medicare coverage for a $5,000 test that helps them and their doctors decide whether radiation is necessary. The test allows doctors to personalize treatment plans. Physicians and patient advocates are strongly pushing back against the proposed cut; they argue losing insurance coverage will restrict patients to choose the best individualized care for themselves.
+ The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) abruptly canceled $68 million in federal grants under the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program, two years before the grants were set to expire, impacting organizations across more than two dozen states. The agency told recipients their programs no longer align with current HHS priorities.
+ On Wednesday, July 15, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced new annual testosterone level testing for male service members aged 30 and older, offering hormone replacement therapy under medical supervision if determined necessary. The Defense Department declined to say whether there would be estrogen screenings for female service members.
Let’s not forget what else was sent our way over the last month…
Saturday, July 4: Medicaid Funding Restored for Planned Parenthood Following Expiration of One-Year Defunding Provision
Planned Parenthood clinics regained access to millions of dollars in essential federal funding after the GOP-led Congress failed to pass an extension of a one-year defunding provision. The temporary ban was originally approved in July 2025 as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
With the provision expired, Planned Parenthood can once again bill Medicaid for critical non-abortion preventive services, including birth control and screenings for sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
By reopening access to low-cost contraception, STI testing and early cancer detection, this shift protects low-income women from preventable health crises and allows them to maintain continuous, life-saving preventive care.
The denial of federal funding over the past year forced Planned Parenthood to close nearly 30 health centers nationwide, impacting roughly 40,000 patients.
Two-thirds of the shuttered clinics were located in medically underserved rural areas where healthcare options were already scarce. Records show 250,000 fewer patient visits over the past year compared to the previous year.
Despite regaining an estimated $800 million in annual federal funding, ongoing financial uncertainty at both the state and federal levels means the shuttered clinics will not reopen.
Nora Walsh-Devries, vice president of political and legislative affairs for PP, said the year of defunding inflicted “irreparable damage” on many already vulnerable communities.
Addressing the broader fallout for healthcare access across the country, Walsh-Devries emphasized:
“The impact of this defund did not result in less abortion care. It just resulted in less people being healthy, less people being able to get care and access in a place that they want to get care and access… and there’s not a way to put a number on how many people were not able to come in and get a cancer screening, and what that did to them.”
Monday, July 6: Upcoming Elections and Abortion Access in Nebraska and Idaho
In Nebraska, a proposed ballot measure that would have enshrined a total abortion ban into the state constitution has failed to garner enough signatures to make it onto this November’s ballot. This is the second time antiabortion group Choose Life Now has tried and failed to get this initiative before Nebraska voters. The proposed language for the ballot measure would have claimed that “a preborn child is a person at every stage of development, beginning at fertilization.” (In 2024, over 300 people in Nebraska requested to have their signatures removed from a ballot measure for a proposed 12-week ban, saying that a different antiabortion group, Protect Women & Children, tricked them into thinking they were signing a pro-abortion measure.)
Even though the initiative failed to make it onto Nebraska’s ballot, the fact that antiabortion groups feel emboldened to propose ballot measures like this suggests the U.S. continues to swing closer and closer to normalizing total abortion bans. Currently, 41 states have some form of abortion restrictions in place while 13 states, including Alabama, Idaho and Texas, have a total abortion ban in place with only extremely narrow exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother.
While Nebraskans refused to put a proposed total ban on their ballot, abortion-rights organizers in Idaho have been working to collect signatures for a proposed ballot measure that would restore abortion rights in the state, revoking Idaho’s total ban. On July 2, volunteers gathered in Boise to turn in over 110,000 signatures they collected for the initiative (called the Reproductive Freedom and Privacy Act). About one-quarter are from registered Republicans, demonstrating support for abortion rights is widespread even in deep red states.
Wednesday, July 8: Graham Platner Suspends Senate Campaign After Sexual Violence Allegations
Maine U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner has suspended his campaign after a former girlfriend accused him of raping her nearly five years ago. Multiple other women have also alleged a history of unsettling and disturbing behavior, according to a New York Times exposé from June. Later in the month, another of Platner’s former girlfriends came forward with the allegation that Platner used to remove condoms during sex without her consent.
Unsurprisingly, some of the discourse surrounding Platner has followed a familiar pattern: Platner denied the allegations. Some of his supporters allege a coordinated smear campaign, or frame Platner’s past actions as being the result of mental health struggles and therefore forgivable.
Meanwhile, women who have come forward describe this exact fear—of not being believed or taken seriously—as one of the reasons why they didn’t feel able to make the accusations previously. Jenny Racicot, another former girlfriend, told POLITICO she chose not to file a police report at the time of Platner’s assault because she feared retaliation from Platner and felt uncomfortable telling law enforcement about the experience.
Besides the sexual violence allegations from multiple women, Platner has also previously come under fire for a now-removed tattoo with Nazi imagery and years of now-deleted misogynistic Reddit comments—including a claim that sexual assault survivors should “just takes some responsibility for themselves” and “act like adults for f-cks sake.”
Tuesday, July 14: Hegseth Blocks Promotions of Women Naval Officers
For the first time in a decade, no active-duty women naval officers will be promoted to admiral this year. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth blocked the promotions of seven senior Navy officers, five of whom are women or people of color, to two-star admiral rank.
The list of eligible promotions was reviewed and decided by a promotion board made up of senior admirals. The board determined that the two-star nominees are among the Navy’s highest performers over careers spanning more than 25 years.
Hegseth provided no rationale for pulling the eligible women officers off the list.
In a July 6 letter, seven Senate Democrats warned Hegseth’s actions appear to disregard the removed officers’ outstanding career achievements and may violate Pentagon policy. Nominated officers should only be pulled from promotion due to moral, mental, physical or professional failings that would raise doubt about an officer’s ability to effectively lead.
When pressed for answers to the senators’ questions, the Pentagon refused to comment on Hegseth’s decision to remove officers from the promotion lists.
Monday, July 15: WTA Becomes First Major Women’s Sports League to Require Genetic Sex Testing
The Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) has become the first major professional sports league to require genetic sex testing for female athletes.
Although the requirement targets transgender women—despite no known trans women currently competing in the WTA—critics warn the policy will disproportionately impact intersex cisgender women, many of whom may be unaware of their intersex status.
Under the new policy, all athletes who intend to participate in WTA tournaments must undergo a one-time screening for the SRY gene, which is typically found on the Y chromosome. While the test is intended to determine if an athlete is a “biological male,” medical experts warn it provides an incomplete picture.
For instance, women with intersex variations such as Swyer syndrome or Complete Androgen Insensitivity syndrome possess XY chromosomes and would fail the SRY test, despite having female anatomy and living their lives as women.
Professor Andrew Sinclair, the geneticist who co-discovered the SRY gene, cautioned against relying solely on the screening:
“Using SRY to establish biological sex is wrong because all it tells you is whether or not the gene is present. It does not tell you how SRY is functioning, whether a testis has formed, whether testosterone is produced and, if so, whether it can be used by the body.”
While the WTA offers exemptions for intersex individuals, qualifying for one requires athletes to undergo further testing and submit personal medical records. Intersex advocacy group interACT strongly criticized the policy, stating:
“Sex testing invades all women’s privacy, forcing them to surrender their personal medical and genetic information… All women, including trans and intersex women, deserve the chance to pursue their athletic dreams.”
The required WTA testing is another capitulation to the ongoing pressure from the Trump administration agenda to keep trans women out of sports, including the Olympics.
Monday, July 20: Online ‘Gooner’ Subculture Targeting Women in Public Retail Spaces
An investigation by The Guardian has documented an online subculture where men record themselves masturbating in public and ejaculating on female shoppers, frequently targeting discount retail locations such as Dollar Tree and Family Dollar stores.
Within these online forums, perpetrators describe the non-consensual acts using terms like “tagging,” “sharking” or “cum-sharking.” Footage is shared to gain approval from peers who celebrate “low-inhibition” behavior. Many participants align with “gooner” subcultures—online groups formed around compulsive porn consumption, obsessive masturbation and disaffected social attitudes.
Lawyers representing survivors have tracked dozens of similar incidents across multiple states dating back to 2017. The investigation highlights how digital communities encourage this real-world abuse while pointing to systemic store vulnerabilities, such as chronic understaffing and inadequate security.
Furthermore, the report details systemic gaps in accountability, showing how victims frequently encountered inaction from store personnel—with some informed after the fact that multiple assaults had occurred in the same location within days—or struggled to get law enforcement to investigate the incidents as criminal sexual assault.
Wednesday, July 22: Colorado Police Pray With Abortion Clinic Harassers
Police officers in Boulder, Colo., were photographed pausing to pray with antiabortion protestors harassing the RISE Collective, an all-trimester abortion clinic, after concerned RISE Collective staff alerted the police of the protesters’ presence.
The RISE Collective originally reached out to law enforcement after threatening social media posts from antiabortion groups. When officers arrived at the clinic, they “spoke with both protesters and employees to ensure everyone’s legal rights were protected,” according to a spokesperson from the department. It was then that the officers agreed to pray with the protestors outside the clinic, as documented in a photo that the antiabortion organization White Rose Resistance Colorado posted on Instagram.
This is the 3rd Tuesday in a row that law enforcement has been called on us, but they have been very friendly and this week even stopped and prayed with us for a bit.
White Rose Resistance Colorado, Instagram
The federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, passed in 1994, protects patients’ right to enter abortion clinics free of physical obstruction or violence, while Colorado has an additional law protecting healthcare facilities. However, Trump has worked to systematically weaken the FACE Act since taking office for the second time. Shortly after his inauguration in January 2025, Trump pardoned 23 antiabortion activists who were in prison for violently harassing abortion clinic patients, doctors and staff. Since then, Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) has proposed a FACE Act Repeal Act in Congress.
One effect of these actions, besides endangering abortion providers and patients, is to normalize increasingly partisan antiabortion displays from law enforcement, as is apparent from the Boulder officers’ choice to engage with the protestors even though the clinic called them for help.
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A note from Ms. editors: We want to hear from you for The Majority, a new campaign collecting stories about how reproductive freedom has enabled readers to build the lives they want and need. Poll after poll shows a majority of Americans support reproductive healthcare access. Yet public debate overlooks the lives shaped by abortion access, contraception, IVF, miscarriage care, maternal healthcare or comprehensive sex education—countless women who chose to pursue an education, have children, not have children, protect their health and chart their own future. Add your voice and complete the sentence: “Access to reproductive choices gave me the freedom to….” Together, these stories will help show not only why reproductive freedom remains a majority value, but also what it makes possible.
Look to these trusted groups if you or a loved one needs to know more about reliable abortion care:
- A one-stop-shop for abortion seekers: I Need An A
- Other websites to explore all your options for abortion care: Plan C Pills, Abortion Finder
- Safe websites to buy abortion medication: Aid Access, Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project, Hey Jane
- If you need help affording abortion care, tell your telemedicine provider or contact an abortion fund near you.
- To protect your digital privacy when planning your abortion, click here.
- For free legal help as a patient or doctor, call If/When/How’s Repro Helpline—844-868-2812—or contact Pregnancy Justice.
- For medical advice, contact the Miscarriage & Abortion Hotline: 833-246-2632.
- If you need to know the abortion law in your state, look to the Center for Reproductive Rights. or Guttmacher Institute.
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