| In December, Kellyanne Conway and a group of Republican strategists met with GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill to urge them to loudly support expanding contraception access — in the hopes that it would draw attention away from the abortion issue. The party has not been listening. And opposition to birth control, which once existed mostly on the fringes of the party, has started creeping into the rhetoric of some Republican firebrands — like Chris Rufo — while most GOP Congressional lawmakers remain quiet on the topic. Since the Alabama Supreme Court ruled in February that frozen embryos should be considered children, some other conservative states have followed suit, introducing “fetal personhood” bills, which are making their ways through the legislatures. Those bills have implications beyond in-vitro fertilization. They could also result in legal challenges to certain types of contraceptives, which may prevent a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus — like some types of IUDs. “[Fetal personhood bills need to] make sure that they’re not prohibiting access to contraceptives in any way shape or form,” Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) tells Women Rule in an interview. But in Congress, the response related to contraception has been lackluster compared to the outpouring of support for IVF, even from Republicans — though two bills to protect and expand access to IVF have been blocked by Republicans in the Senate. The fetal personhood debate is catching fire as criticism of birth control is becoming more mainstream among influential figures and organizations on the right. The same day the Alabama Supreme Court issued its ruling, Tesla CEO Elon Musk wrote on X that hormonal birth control “makes you fat” and “doubles risk of depression & triples risk of suicide,” — a claim that experts dispute and which he based on a single study from 2017. A few days later, conservative activist Rufo wrote on the platform that “the pill causes health problems for many women” and “‘Recreational sex’ is a large part of the reason we have so many single-mother households, which drives poverty, crime, and dysfunction. The point of sex is to create children—this is natural, normal, and good.’” He was referencing a May tweet from The Heritage Foundation. The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 — an outline for the next conservative president — proposes reinstating Trump-era “religious and moral” exceptions for employers, allowing them to choose whether to provide coverage for contraception. “Anyone who cares about contraception should be worried,” says Alexandra LaManna, a former Biden administration assistant press secretary who focused on reproductive rights. The push to restrict contraception access is also coming from the courts. On Tuesday, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a Texas law requiring parental consent for minors to obtain contraception — even from federally funded clinics. That law could also complicate the sale of Opill — the first FDA-approved over-the-counter birth control — in the state, which is expected to be available in pharmacies and online by the end of March. A spokesperson for Opill told Women Rule that Perrigo, the company behind the product, “distributes and markets Opill in accordance with the approved label and all applicable laws,” but did not respond to specific questions about Texas. Democrats have taken notice of the push to restrict contraceptives — and they’ve taken action. Since 2024 began, 31 bills that would create a legal or constitutional right to birth control have been introduced in 15 states, according to a POLITICO analysis of data from the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion-rights think tank. “I think there's definitely more conservatives who are openly opposed to contraception [than in recent years],” says Mary Ziegler, a law professor at UC Davis and historian on health care and conservatism. “Now, there's a broader variety of arguments against contraception that you see people making. There's arguments that contraception is dangerous — that it causes cancer or depression. There are arguments about the ‘Trad wife’: ‘you don't need contraception.’ There are arguments about parental rights, and of course, the argument that contraceptives are in fact abortifacients and violate fetal rights,” Ziegler says. “We've seen not just a proliferation in quantity, but also in variety.” Some Congressional conservatives may be keeping lips zipped on the issue — cognizant that 2024 is an election year — because of the widespread popularity of contraception. A 2022 FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos survey found support for both IUDs and oral birth control above 80 percent. “The very socially conservative, religious right within the party tends to be a louder portion of the party, and they certainly are directing a lot of the agenda right now,” says Ariel Hill-Davis, co-founder and director of policy at Republican Women for Progress. “And the natural next step — that they've been saying they're going to target — is contraception.”
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