ACLU et al. v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services et al.

The FOIA seeks all records from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and its associated agencies, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) and ORR, from January 2023 to the present regarding the federal government’s treatment of unaccompanied pregnant youth, including documentation of handling requests for and ensuring access to all manner of pregnancy-related care, such as abortion, pre-natal care, and childbirth.

Unaccompanied immigrant youth come to the United States without their parents, often fleeing violence or abuse in their home country. They usually have family in the United States who they are seeking to be reunited with. But until then, they are placed in shelters overseen by ORR. Some young people first learn that they are pregnant when they receive an initial medical exam at the shelter. Given the high rates of sexual assault on the journey to the U.S., some of these young people are pregnant as a result of violence.

In 2017, the first Trump administration implemented a policy — which the ACLU successfully challenged — outright denying pregnant unaccompanied youth access to abortion care. Building off the settlement in the ACLU’s case, the Biden administration instituted policies and issued regulations requiring ORR to prioritize placing pregnant youth in states without abortion bans to ensure access to miscarriage treatment and abortion care. If a minor is placed in a state with an abortion ban, and she requests an abortion, she must be transported to a state where abortion is legal.

But the current Trump administration has announced that it intends to change the current ORR regulations regarding abortion access for unaccompanied immigrant youth. Immigration and reproductive rights advocates are concerned that the Trump administration will either try to impose a de facto or outright ban on abortion.