WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Roger F. Wicker, R-Miss., ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has called on the Secretary of Defense to support claims made by the Department of Defense regarding their policy of using taxpayer money to fund travel for service members who want to have abortions.

Recent unconfirmed reports have suggested that only 12 service members have used the authorities provided by the new abortion policy, despite earlier claims from the Department that reversing the rule would have “significant implications” across the services. 

“To date, we have yet to receive any substantive data to support these assertions,” Wicker wrote. “I now ask again for the specific data considered by the Department of Defense.”

Wicker urged the secretary to end the policy and shift his focus back to deterrence within the military.

“The United States is at a pivotal moment for national defense, and there is no time for distractions. When the Department of Defense becomes sidetracked by divisive political sideshows, the missions of deterrence and readiness are the first to suffer,” Wicker wrote. “The Department of Defense’s focus should always be our national defense, not on circumventing Federal law to facilitate abortions. I ask you to rescind these policies immediately.”

Read the whole letter here or below. Read more about Wicker’s efforts to keep the military focused on deterrence here. Read previous correspondence with the Department of Defense on their dubious readiness claims related to abortion here and here.

Honorable Lloyd J. Austin III

Secretary of Defense

1000 Defense Pentagon

Washington, DC 20301-1000

Dear Secretary Austin:

I request information on the use of the abortion policies concerning reimbursed travel and authorized absence that your department implemented in February 2023. I received information that the total number of women who have been granted administrative absence and reimbursed travel pursuant to this policy is approximately 12. Can you please confirm whether this information is correct? If not, please provide me the number of women who have been granted administrative absence and reimbursed travel pursuant to the policy.

Additionally, I request information on the potential use of this policy to facilitate late-term abortions. Through a plain reading of the policy, it appears that an eligible woman in the eighth month of her pregnancy could travel at the expense of the Department of Defense from a state such as Mississippi and obtain an abortion in a state such as Oregon where abortion is legal at all stages of pregnancy. Is this interpretation correct? If not, please clarify how I have misinterpreted the policy.

Finally, in our letters dated July 17, 2022, November 21, 2022, and March 1, 2023, my Republican colleagues and I asked you for evidence to support the Department of Defense’s claim in a June 28, 2022, memorandum that the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization would have “significant implications” for the “readiness of the Force.” To date, we have yet to receive any substantive data to support these assertions. I now ask again for the specific data considered by the Department of Defense in arriving at the above claim.

As I have previously stated, the United States is at a pivotal moment for national defense, and there is no time for distractions. When the Department of Defense becomes sidetracked by divisive political sideshows, the missions of deterrence and readiness are the first to suffer.?The Department of Defense’s focus should always be our national defense, not on circumventing Federal law to facilitate abortions. I ask you to rescind these policies immediately. 

Sincerely,