President Donald Trump pledged to broaden access to in vitro fertilization, but groups that oppose abortion have halted efforts to expand IVF access for military members while promoting anti-IVF bills in the states.
“It is the policy of my administration to ensure reliable access to IVF treatment, including by easing unnecessary statutory or regulatory burdens to make IVF treatment drastically more affordable,” Trump said in a February 2025 executive order pledging to “make it easier for loving and longing mothers and fathers to have children.”
Trump called himself the “fertilization president” and promoted “baby bonuses for a new baby boom” to offset declines in the U.S. birth rate, which has fallen 23% since 2007. The nation faces a “demographic dead end,” says a report from the Institute for Family Studies.
But the Southern Baptist Convention and other groups that oppose abortion say IVF is not the answer to the declining birth rates, or to infertility, which affects some 10% of reproductive-age adults.
“The God-given, good desire for children does not justify every means of creating them,” said the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, in language used in an SBC resolution calling on believers to “advocate for the government” to restrict IVF for all Americans.
“We cannot conclude that the desire for children necessitates that the government bear the responsibility of ensuring this desire becomes a reality,” said the ERLC, which says assisted reproductive technologies, or ART, “present a moral conundrum about which potential parents are likely less-than informed.”
IVF procedures typically create many more embryos than are implanted in wombs, and anti-abortion groups say the unused embryos, which are stored or discarded, are human lives lost.
Opposition to IVF has successfully halted legislation that would pay for military members to access IVF. And a 2024 ruling by Alabama’s Supreme Court that embryos are “unborn children” led three of the state’s fertility clinics to halt the treatments.
Graphic created by Pregnancy Justice
Currently, 17 states have some form of “fetal personhood” laws and judicial decisions that grant unborn fetuses, embryos and fertilized eggs the same legal status as people who have been born, said a group that thinks only pregnant people should decide such issues.
Some 10 million children have been born via IVF since the procedure was devised half a century ago. In 2021, 2.3% of U.S. births happened through ART, mostly through IVF. Some 40% to 50% of large employers offer IVF coverage, and about 15 states mandate such coverage.
Military members whose fertility has been compromised by an injury or illness during their service can apply for IVF coverage, but other service members must pay for IVF treatments, which can cost tens of thousands of dollars.
After years of bipartisan support for military access to IVF, in 2026 Senate Republicans on the Armed Services Committee opposed any expansion. During their meeting, the stance of anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America was read to the senators. SBA, a $25 million advocacy group, says it “leads the fight to end abortion.”
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson at the opening gala for “America Reads the Bible” (Photo by America Reads the Bible via Facebook)
In both 2024 and 2025, Republicans and Democrats approved Department of Defense budgets that would have expanded IVF access. But in both years, House Speaker Mike Johnson, a conservative Southern Baptist, removed the IVF provisions from the budget before it became law.
In 2026, the former bipartisan support for IVF evaporated. IVF access wasn’t even included in the budget for Johnson to strip it out.
“The debate over IVF has become a hot-button policy and political issue, despite the medical procedure to help people become pregnant having been mainstream in the United States for nearly half a century,” says a report from Stanford University.
Critics say a vocal minority of Americans are making childbirth harder for the vast majority who approve IVF. A 2024 study from Pew Research Center found seven in 10 Americans “say in vitro fertilization access is a good thing,” while just 8% say it is a bad thing, and 22% are unsure.
Tammy Duckworth
Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth, a military veteran who gave birth using IVF, supports service members’ access to IVF through the TRICARE military insurance program.
“Trump claimed on the campaign trail that he’d make IVF free for all Americans yet stood aside when Speaker Johnson personally stripped IVF coverage away from our troops at the last minute this past December,” said Duckworth, who claims service members have double the rate of infertility as the U.S. population. “It is the bare minimum that we provide them with the same access to IVF coverage that Members of Congress enjoy.”
Recent defense budgets have included coverage for military members to freeze their eggs or sperm if they’re ordered to hazardous duty locations.
Related:
Remembering the early days of controversy over IVF in America | Opinion by Kristen Thomason
Alabama politicians flee IVF backlash
IVF, CPAC and MAGA: Christian nationalism erupts to the surface | Opinion by Robert P. Jones
A deeper look at Alabama judge Tom Parker and his desire for the righteous to rule America
Here’s what you need to know to understand that SBC resolution opposing IVF | Analysis by Mark Wingfield