Bioethics Public Policy Report: August 19, 2025
STATE By State
A man in Baltimore, Maryland, avoided jailtime after assailing two elderly pro-life activists engaged in sidewalk counseling outside of an abortion clinic. The assailant instead was ordered to one year of home detention. The Thomas More Society, which provided victim’s counsel to one of the activists beaten, denounced the sentence as “a slap on the wrist.” For further information, click here.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin directed the Virginia state police to conduct a criminal investigation into allegedly school-funded abortions occurring in Fairfax County. The investigation is the result of a report with detailed information alleging that school district officials were facilitating abortions for minors without parental consent. For further information, click here.
Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey signed into law a bill that will conceal the identities of doctors who prescribe and ship the chemical abortion drug mifepristone into the state and will also require hospitals to perform “emergency abortions.” For further information, click here.
Planned Parenthood is closing its Louisiana locations, citing lack of funding following the passage of the “Big, Beautiful Bill.” While Planned Parenthood was not permitted under Louisiana law to perform abortions in the state, it was assisting patients in obtaining abortions in other states. For further information, click here.
Federal Courts
The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld Arkansas’s ban on transgender procedures for minors. The Eighth Circuit found that the lower court’s ruling conflicted with the Supreme Court’s ruling in U.S. v. Skrmetti, which upheld Tennessee’s ban on transgender procedures for minors. For further information, click here.
A federal court in Philadelphia ruled against the Little Sisters of the Poor in another challenge to their requests for exemptions under the Affordable Care Act from being required to cover abortions and contraceptives in their healthcare plans. The ruling, if upheld, would strike down the Trump administration’s religious conscience rule. For further information, click here.
A transgender athlete has sued the NCAA for discrimination on the basis of gender identity after being barred from participating in women’s sports. For further information, click here.
The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals overruled a federal district court judge’s ruling allowing a South Carolina school district to restrict bathroom access on the basis of biological sex. South Carolina intends to appeal the case to the Supreme Court. For further information, click here.
national
President Trump signed an executive order mandating a probe into “debanking,” that is, the closing of accounts by banks of certain “high risk” industries. Conservative groups have alleged that the practice has been wielded as a form of discrimination for unpopular viewpoints. For further information, click here.
Attorneys general of 22 states have written a letter to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., asking HHS to put back into place certain safety measures to the chemical abortion drug, mifepristone. Secretary Kennedy has already stated that HHS would investigate the safety of the drug. The attorneys general cite to a study by the by the Ethics and Public Policy Center published earlier this year that indicated that 10% of women suffer from serious adverse effects after using mifepristone. For further information, click here.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has proposed a rule that would end abortion coverage for veterans and eligible civilians. The only exceptions would be in cases where the mother’s life is in danger. To read the proposed rule, click here. For further information, click here.
international
Uruguay’s Chamber of Representatives passed a bill that would legalize euthanasia in the country for any 18-year-old “who suffers from one or more chronic, incurable, and irreversible pathologies or health conditions that seriously impair their quality of life, causing unbearable suffering.” If passed in the Senate, the bill would become law, making Uruguay the third South American country to legalize euthanasia. For further information, click here.
In Europe, the Alliance Defending Freedom is challenging a recent report by the European Parliamentary Forum for Sexual and Reproductive Rights that refers to religiously motivated pro-life groups as extremists. For further information, click here.
of note
A report by the Family Research Council found that there were 415 incidents of overtly hostile activity towards churches in 2024. To read the report, click here. For further information, click here.
A baby was born to a couple through “embryo adoption” after having been cryogenically frozen through in vitro fertilization over 30 years ago. For further information, click here.
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The National Catholic Bioethics Center website is a significant resource for bioethics information. NCBC bioethicists are also on call for consultation twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, at 215-877-2660.
Justin Corman
Justin Corman is a guest editor at the NCBC, and a student at Ave Maria School of Law.