Dear Editor,

The latest decision by the Trump administration, supposedly following the “President’s wishes,” is simply stunning and outrageous. According to the NY Times, 9.7 million dollars of contraceptives that were intended to be given to poor people across the globe, had become stranded in a warehouse in Belgium when the Trump team dismantled USAID (U S Agency for International Development).

Despite offers by seven different international organizations, including the Gates Foundation and the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, to buy or accept them as a donation, these contraceptives were destroyed at the command of Russel Vought, who heads the White House Office of Management and Budget and seems to wield incredible power. 

According to the Times article, the government would have incurred no costs or might have even been able to recoup up to seven million dollars in taxpayer funds. Instead, it cost an estimated $167,000 to destroy them.  That represents nearly $10 million in US taxpayer money incinerated.

 A statement from the hollowed-out USAID falsely suggested that these contraceptives induced abortion. “President Trump is committed to protecting the lives of unborn children all around the world,” the statement said. “The administration will no longer supply abortifacient birth control under the guise of foreign aid.” “Abortifacient” is defined as causing an abortion.

According to the Times article, “U.S.A.I.D. is prohibited by law from procuring abortifacients. None of the products held in the warehouse in Belgium were abortifacients, according to inventory lists obtained by The Times.” The listed products included pills, IUDs, and hormonal implants which stop pregnancy by preventing ovulation or fertilization. “This fact had repeatedly been made clear to State Department officials by veteran global health program staff.” The Danish government tried for months to keep this from happening. 

The Times article continues, “The deliberate destruction of nearly $10 million worth of contraceptives, under the blatantly false pretense that they are abortifacients, is an outrageous act of cruelty,” said Beth Schlachter, director of U.S. external relations for MSI Reproductive Choices, an organization that had repeatedly offered to take over the distribution of the supplies rather than see them destroyed. “This decision will cost lives, derail progress in global health and strip millions of people of the basic tools they need to plan their families and protect their health.”

Instead of allowing them to be purchased, the administration destroyed them this past Thursday. We know that Republicans are against abortion, but apparently it now extends to contraception as well. I find it curious and hypocritical that the party that proclaims they are for “FREEDOM,” prevents women first from having the FREEDOM to control their own bodies by overturning Roe v. Wade, and now appears to be against women having the FREEDOM to be able to control when they will have children.

It seems cruel, anti-family, and insensitive all at the same time. Being against abortion is one thing, but it seems contradictory to be against contraception at the same time.  Doesn’t this increase the likelihood that someone might seek one?

Bill Thibedeau,

Gilpin County