Five Major Key Moments in the Assault on the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.

Twelve months prior, groups dedicated to gender equality were steeling themselves against a second Trump term. Scarcely anyone expected. The volume and speed of presidential directives originating in the White House were regarded as a calculated strategy to overwhelm and create panic. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as groups rushed to address the shortfall left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this merely marked the opening act.

The Washington leadership has been the central catalyst, bolstered by vigorous campaigning by deeply conservative factions exploiting the situation to solidify transnational relationships with like-minded governments.

This opposition to progressive rights signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as affluent financiers and clans that seek to undermine forward movement on multiple topics. This encompasses reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.

They pursue this agenda via influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.

We look at five junctures that impacted the security, respect, and well-being of girls and women.

USAID Dismantled

In the month of March, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is halted, causing international chaos, a leading figure in the administration announces that a vast majority of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. US diplomats, former presidents and relief and public health authorities condemn the news, stating that people will die as a result. Human rights advocates say that the closure of the organization is more than a funding crisis, it is a savage attack on human rights and family planning and reproductive care. Numerous groups say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by reduced funding, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, data shows how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Another pair of leading funders follow with their own cuts. A director of a global justice organization says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is a move to appease a political ally.

Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference

In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a biannual gathering held in parallel with the international conference on women's rights. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they applaud shifts in US policy on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the UN secretary general opens the gender equality forum with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is resurgent, after a report shows that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding established norms on key women’s rights issues around the world.

African ‘Family Values’ Conferences

Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa focused on the conventional household and state autonomy triggers anxiety among equality campaigners. In early May, a national leader and spouse open a large assembly to resist what they label external influences undermining local norms. A shortly thereafter, another Pan-African conference on conservative ethics is held. Both events are attended by leading American and European conservative activists, including heads of influential networks. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to stand up to “radical global social engineering” of international organizations. In the following month, a major religious institution hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in the region, an event that health activists say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Advocates remark that the scale of their presence has increased markedly.

Contraceptive Destruction Order

As health facilities across Africa report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in midsummer plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from family planning options, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “heartless and dangerous”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains in deadlock as host nation officials refuse to permit the destruction of viable medicines.

‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded

Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which cuts American funding for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the ban was reimposed in the first month of the year. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. But in October, the US announces it intends to expand the global gag rule to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. More details on the expansion of the rule are anticipated next year. A expert in child welfare says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being discussed with African nations will become contingent upon adopting the new, wider policy.