Overview

• Under the proposed rule, the VA would reinstate the 1992 exclusion on abortions and abortion counseling across its medical benefits package and CHAMPVA, restricting procedures to cases certified as life-endangering.
• The change, published in the Federal Register on August 1, launches a 30-day public comment window through September 3 before the administration can finalize the regulation.
• VA officials contend the Biden administration’s 2022 expansion exceeded the department’s authority under the Veterans Health Care Act of 1992 and amounted to federal overreach.
• Sen. James Lankford and other Republican lawmakers praise the move as a return to bipartisan precedent, while the National Women’s Law Center condemns it as stripping veterans of reproductive freedom.
• The proposal intensifies the post-Dobbs clash over federal versus state control of abortion access within veterans’ health care.