Five Defining Key Moments in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.

This time last year, groups dedicated to gender equality were anticipating a new Trump administration. Scarcely anyone expected. The torrent and swiftness of White House mandates originating in the White House were interpreted as a deliberate tactic to paralyze through overload. The tactic proved effective – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as agencies hastened to compensate for the loss left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this merely marked the opening act.

The Trump administration has been the primary force, aided by relentless activism by deeply conservative factions seizing the opportunity to build worldwide connections with ideological partners.

The movement against gender equality denotes an international coalition of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as billionaire families and individuals that aim to roll back forward movement on multiple topics. This encompasses access to termination, gay and trans protections, alternative households, and factual sexual instruction.

They pursue this agenda via lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.

We examine five junctures that affected the protection, honor, and existence of girls and women.

The Dismantling of USAID

In early spring, shortly after a prominent humanitarian funder is its funds are blocked, causing international chaos, a senior US official reveals that over eighty percent of the institution's work will be scrapped. American foreign service officers, ex-presidents and aid and medical specialists criticize the move, warning that lives will be lost. Rights defenders say that the demise of the agency is more than a funding crisis, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and family planning and reproductive care. A multitude of agencies say females will bear the brunt by shrinking assistance, especially in war zones. 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 millions more to come. Another pair of leading funders proceed with parallel slashes. A director of a global justice organization says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is an attempt to placate a powerful partner.

Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting

In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a biannual gathering held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they applaud shifts in US policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is back, after a analysis demonstrates that groups opposing progressive rights are systematically eroding longstanding consensus on key women’s rights issues around the world.

Summits Promoting Conservative Norms

Over the summer, a sequence of gatherings in Africa focused on the conservative family structures and national independence raises concerns among equality campaigners. In the start of May, a president and first lady open a large assembly to combat what they label external influences undermining local norms. A shortly thereafter, another continental gathering on family values is held. Both events are attended by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker calls on African NGOs to push back against “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of international organizations. In June, a global faith group hosts a family strengthening conference in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Activists observe that the extent of foreign involvement has grown significantly.

US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives

As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are running out of contraceptives, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in midsummer plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A major reproductive health federation states that their destruction will deny millions of women and girls from access to birth control, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about forcing a conservative worldview globally” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “callous and reckless”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials will not allow the destruction of viable medicines.

Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy

Reviving the global gag rule, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the ban was reimposed in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in October, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. More details on the broader enforcement are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that new US aid packages being negotiated with countries in Africa will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.