Dozens of Republicans signed a letter to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin demanding that he rescind an abortion travel policy that they assert violates U.S. law. 

According to the 27 Senate Republicans, the policy is in violation of the law because it circumvents Congress, as Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) has said in his vocal opposition to the policy.

“You have broken your promise to the American people not to politicize the military, and your actions have harmed and threaten to further harm institutional norms within our democracy,” the senators write in the letter, exclusively provided first to The Daily Signal.

More from The Letter

A memorandum dated June 28, 2022, which Austin forwarded to high-ranking officials at the Department of Defense (DOD) subsequent to the Supreme Court's ruling to reverse the abortion precedent established in Roe v. Wade (1973) in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, was criticized by the senators in their letter.

“All legislative power is vested in Congress, and the Executive branch is responsible for implementing and enforcing the law,” they explain. “While the Department [of Defense] may issue regulations, it can only do so under the laws authorized and enacted by Congress.

"But, Congress never authorized the Department to expend funds to facilitate abortions and, until the Policy was issued, the military never facilitated abortions except in cases of rape, incest, or where the life of the mother would be endangered if the unborn child were carried to term.”

Austin instructed DOD commanders in the memorandum that abortion-seeking active-duty personnel should be granted official travel reimbursement beyond their state of station.

“Now taxpayers—many of whom have deeply-held religious and moral objections to abortions—are on the hook to facilitate the very abortions they fundamentally oppose,” the senators added.

“Indeed, a Marist poll in January 2023 found that 60% of Americans strongly oppose the use of taxpayer dollars to pay for an abortion, consistent with polls taken throughout recent years.”

Alleged Motivation for the Policy

The lawmakers asserted that the DOD officials were pushing back against the nation's high court's divisive decision.

“Rather than respect the Supreme Court’s decision, you decided to engage the Department, and our men and women in uniform, in a policy debate properly reserved for the legislature."

Austin has made the case that Dobbs had “readiness, recruiting, and retention implications for the Force,” however, the senators countered that, saying that there was as yet no data to support that claim and only a few service members or dependents had even made use of the policy.

Because of his objection to the policy, Tuberville has put a hold on confirming military appointees to protest the policy, as Republicans pointed out in their letter.

“Our men and women in uniform deserve Senate-confirmed leadership but the current situation began with your original sin of promulgating the policy,” they write.