Affordable Care Act

The Affordable Care Act (ACA), signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2010, granted healthcare coverage to more than 31 million Americans. Republicans have consistently tried to kill the ACA since its passage. The loss of the ACA would have devastating impacts on Americans’ health, especially women as the ACA bans sex discrimination in health insurance, mandates coverage for maternatiy and pregnancy care and requires coverage of birth control and mammograms without copays or deductibles.

‘The Rent Eats First’: 10 Days Without SNAP Benefits Shows How America’s Safety Net Is Failing Its Most Vulnerable

PUBLISHED 11/10/2025 by

Throughout the United States, the millions of families that rely on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits—which make up 12.3 percent of Americans—have spent at least 10 days without them. The uncertainties about whether they will return, and when, has left families desperate. For many, the crisis has reinforced what they’ve long felt: The nation’s social safety programs are failing to meet real, everyday needs—and across Iowa, Michigan and Pennsylvania, Americans are growing disillusioned with politicians who can’t protect their most basic ones.

For many disabled Americans, losing SNAP also means losing the nutritional needs that help keep them out of the floundering U.S. healthcare system. They shared with Ms. a glimpse into what the past 10 days without SNAP have looked like, and what millions of Americans who rely on these programs actually need.

“If I lose benefits, am I going to be able to remain going to school?”

“They’re thinking about next week. Will they have food? Will they be hungry?”

“The problem is, the rent always eats first, or the house payment is going to eat first. After that? Are you going to [get your] medicine? No, we [have to pay] our utilities…. then you [think], ‘Okay, I’ve only got enough for either food or my medicine.’”

The War on Women Report: Government Shutdown Continues; Another Woman Denied Emergency Abortion Care; FDA Approves Generic Mifepristone

PUBLISHED 11/3/2025 by and

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:
—Turning Point hosted an event at the University of Alabama advocating the death penalty as punishment for abortion patients.
—After being denied care for her ectopic pregnancy by an antiabortion OB-GYN, a 28-year-old woman in Illinois was forced to travel to multiple hospitals and healthcare centers before receiving life-saving care.
—Vocal abortion opponent Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) introduced the Prohibiting Abortion and Transgender Procedures on the Exchanges Act, seeking to halt any healthcare plans under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) from funding abortions, even in states that preserve abortion access. 
—The Texas Supreme Court has ruled that judges can decline to marry same-sex couples if doing so goes against their religious beliefs.

… and more.

Keeping Score: No Kings Protest Turnout Makes History; SCOTUS Threatens Voting Rights; Gen Z Women Are Most Liberal in U.S.

PUBLISHED 10/28/2025 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week:
—No Kings Day marks the largest single-day protest in American history.
—The ongoing government shutdown could soon disrupt SNAP benefits, another unprecedented moment in U.S. history. “We have never seen our government turn on its people this way,” said Abby Leibman, president and CEO of MAZON.
—House Democrats rebuke Pete Hegseth’s hostility towards women in the military.
—Speaker Mike Johnson refuses to swear in newly elected Democrat, Rep. Adelita Grijalva.
—Return-to-office policies are pushing women out of the workforce.
—Remembering legendary trans activist Miss Major Griffin-Gracy.
—The Supreme Court heard arguments challenging the Voting Rights Act.

… and more.

Millions Face Sharp Increases in ACA Premiums if Enhanced Tax Credits Expire

PUBLISHED 10/21/2025 by , , and

Affordable Care Act (ACA) enhanced premium tax credits—first introduced in 2021 and extended through 2025 by the Inflation Reduction Act—are set to expire at the end of this year. These tax credits have made Marketplace coverage far more affordable for millions of Americans, both by increasing financial assistance for low-income enrollees and by extending eligibility to many middle-income families for the first time. Since their introduction, enrollment in the ACA Marketplace has more than doubled—from about 11 million to over 24 million people.

If Congress allows the enhanced tax credits to expire, most Marketplace enrollees will face steep premium hikes. According to new analysis by KFF, the average enrollee’s annual premium payment would more than double—from $888 in 2025, to $1,904 in 2026. Some families would lose eligibility for any financial help at all.

A 60-year-old couple earning $85,000, for example, would see their premiums rise by over $22,600 next year—nearly a quarter of their income.

Without congressional action, millions could lose access to affordable coverage, threatening one of the ACA’s most significant achievements: making health insurance accessible to Americans across income levels.

This Manufactured Shutdown Threatens Healthcare and Reproductive Freedom

PUBLISHED 10/9/2025 by

This is not governing—it’s sabotage, carried out at the expense of Americans’ health and freedoms.

In July, House Republicans created a healthcare crisis when they rammed through a budget that gutted Medicaid, defunded Planned Parenthood and put a target on the Affordable Care Act. Now, instead of fixing the mess they made, they’re steering us toward a government shutdown that will only compound the damage.

Americans across the political spectrum value these programs. Medicaid, Planned Parenthood and the ACA are lifelines in red states and blue states alike. People may disagree on politics, but they overwhelmingly agree that their families deserve access to affordable healthcare. That’s why the position to protect care and keep the government open is both the responsible path forward and the popular one.

Keeping Score: Trump’s Dangerous Claims About Tylenol; Government Shutdown Begins; Diddy’s Four-Year Sentence

PUBLISHED 10/9/2025 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week:
—Doctors push back against Trump’s dangerous claims that Tylenol in pregnancy increases the risk of autism.
—The U.S. entered a government shutdown, affecting millions of federal workers.
—Sean “Diddy” Combs was sentenced to four years in prison.
—Zoologist and anthropologist Jane Goodall died at age 91.
—University of California students and faculty are suing the Trump administration for violating free speech rights.
—Student activists are stepping up to get around birth control bans on campus.
—Louisiana admits non-citizens voting is not a systemic problem.
—The ACLU and religious freedom organizations are suing to block 14 more Texas school districts from implementing a law requiring classrooms to display Ten Commandments posters.

… and more.

How the Government Shutdown Is Hitting the Healthcare System—and What the Battle Over ACA Subsidies Means

PUBLISHED 10/7/2025 by

Major rifts over key healthcare issues are at the heart of the federal government shutdown that began at the stroke of midnight on Oct. 1, 2025. Without a budget agreement in place, Trump ordered most federal agencies to wind down their nonessential activities. The shutdown will continue until Congress passes either a short-term or long-term funding bill and Trump signs it.

Government shutdowns are nothing new, but as a health policy expert, I worry this time around the impasse may have far-reaching effects on healthcare.

What Does a Federal Government Shutdown Mean for Women’s Healthcare? A Stealthy Rollback of Coverage

PUBLISHED 9/25/2025 by

If cuts to premium tax credits and Medicaid stick, this won’t just be another budget fight. It will be a quiet repeal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)—and women will bear the brunt of it.

Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries have put forward a reasonable path: Roll back the Medicaid cuts and make premium tax credits permanent. States are bracing for the Medicaid cuts, warning Washington that slashing the program would destabilize families and hospitals in their states. Extending these tax credits has bipartisan support. By any definition of negotiation, the offer has something for both sides.

Yet President Trump has dug in, canceling meetings, while the House has left town. With Republicans in control of all three branches of government, the responsibility for protecting women and families rests squarely with them.

This isn’t about “other people.” It’s about all of us.

IVF Promises, Healthcare Cuts: The New Reproductive Hypocrisy

PUBLISHED 9/23/2025 by

In today’s political landscape, fertility has become a brand—plastered across speeches and press releases as a symbol of family values and new life. But behind the fanfare (and empty promises) of IVF expansion lies a much darker truth: Healthcare systems are collapsing, maternity wards are closing, and protections against toxic chemicals are being rolled back. The result is a reproductive paradox in which women are pushed to give birth in environments that are increasingly hostile to their survival.

This is not a coherent pro-family agenda. It is chaos disguised as care—fertility promoted when politically useful, maternal health ignored when inconvenient, and science dismissed when it interferes with corporate interests. Families are promised new beginnings, but stripped of the very resources needed to support them.

Until mothers and children are placed at the center of policy—not as props but as the purpose—the reproductive hypocrisy will persist.

The ACA Promised Access to Birth Control. The System Still Says No.

PUBLISHED 9/21/2025 by

Everyone has a defining memory that shapes how they come to see the world. For me, a Gen Z born in 2007, it was kneeling in front of the television, eyes fixed on the screen, watching Barack Obama take the oath of office.

However, more than a decade after the Affordable Care Act (ACA) promised access to birth control, I found myself at the pharmacy counter, forced to walk away without it. My insurance refused to cover the pills I need to regulate my hormones, to prevent a third surgery for cystic breasts, and to alleviate excruciating period pain. That was my first confrontation with a false promise—but hardly the first loss of what I considered a secure right.

In theory, the ACA requires most health insurance plans to cover all FDA-approved contraceptive methods without any cost-sharing. In reality, that promise breaks down at the pharmacy counter—whether on account of delays, rejections, cost-sharing and a host of exceptions. In addition, states are eagerly stepping in to empower pharmacists to decide who does not get contraception.