What Democrats are Talking About When They Talk About Pregnancy Monitoring

Fact-checkers are piling on Tim Walz’s claim during the presidential debate that Project 2025 calls for the monitoring of pregnant women. Walz said that a future Trump administration would establish a new federal position — a national pregnancy coordinator — tasked with monitoring all pregnancies in conjunction with a pregnancy registry.

While FactCheck.org and other sources are technically correct in their assessment — the plan does not call for monitoring “all” pregnancies — their reporting hides the disturbing truth. The plan calls for monitoring miscarriages and abortions and for establishing a federal department tasked with managing the monitoring.

So, there you have it, ladies; you only have to worry about being monitored by the federal government if you want to terminate a pregnancy, are forced to terminate a pregnancy for medical reasons, or have a miscarriage. That’s reassuring, right?

FACT: Project 2025 calls for establishing a Special Representative for Domestic Women’s Health who would lead a new Department of Life, which would replace the Department of Health and Human Services.

FACT: Project 2025 calls for requiring every abortion, miscarriage, stillbirth, and incidental pregnancy loss from medical treatments like chemotherapy to be reported to the federal government.

FACT: Republicans have already shown their hand concerning a national pregnancy registry. In early 2024, Senators Katie Britt (R-Ala.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), and Kevin Cramer (R-N.Dak.) introduced the Orwellian More Opportunities for Moms to Succeed (MOMS) Act, which would require HHS to establish a government-run website, pregnancy.gov, which would ostensibly offer resources (anti-abortion only, of course) to pregnant women but would in fact “encourage” pregnant women to provide the government with their contact information.

FROM THE DOCUMENT

Project 2025 Mandate for Leadership, p. 455: “CDC should require monitoring and reporting for complications due to abortion…”

Project 2025 Mandate for Leadership, p. 455: “Because liberal states have now become sanctuaries for abortion tourism, HHS should use every available tool, including the cutting of funds, to ensure that every state reports exactly how many abortions take place within its borders, at what gestational age of the child, for what reason, the mother’s state of residence, and by what method.”

Project 2025 Mandate for Leadership, p. 455: The CDS “should also ensure that statistics are separated by category: spontaneous miscarriage; treatments that incidentally result in the death of a child (such as chemotherapy); stillbirths; and induced abortion.”

J.D. Vance has said that abortion should be illegal in all cases. J.D. Vance has said that law enforcement officers should have access to women’s medical records so they can be monitored should they want to do something perfectly legal, like going to another state to access abortion. Donald Trump has said that women and doctors should face criminal charges if they participate in providing or receiving abortion services.

Do not let Republicans whitewash their records. They want big government to make decisions for you and your families.