In 2022, Michigan’s citizens went to the polls to make their voices heard on an issue of systemic constitutional importance: the right of a woman to terminate her pregnancy. By a wide margin, Michigan’s citizens voted to enact the Reproductive Freedom for All Amendment (“RFFA”), an amendment to Michigan’s Constitution that eliminates outdated restrictions on reproductive healthcare and protects the fundamental right to reproductive freedom in Michigan, including the freedom for Michiganders to decide to end their pregnancies. The RFFA ensures that Michiganders have “the right to make and effectuate decisions about all matters relating to pregnancy,” including “abortion care,” without the State of Michigan “discriminat[ing] in the protection or enforcement of this fundamental right.”

As the United States ("US") approaches its rescheduled 4th Universal Periodic Review ("UPR"), individuals’ sexual and reproductive health and rights (“SRHR”) continue to deteriorate across the country. Since our previous submission, both restrictions on reproductive healthcare access, in particular abortion care, and targeted, state-sanctioned violence, intimidation, discrimination, and harassment of communities by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) and Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) have increased. This submission updates this coalition’s April 2025 submission. It includes quantitative research and qualitative data gathered from abortion funds, healthcare providers, doulas, and persons detained or deported by ICE agents. Testimony is from individuals who have been directly harmed by restrictive abortion laws and/or by the recent unlawful changes in and enforcement of immigration policies or from individuals whose clients or patients have suffered such harm.

The United States tracks adolescent sexual and reproductive health (SRH) indicators through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) via the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS) and the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS). Furthermore, the Office of Population Affairs, within the Department of Health and Human Services, maintains ongoing data reporting, collection, and monitoring of changes and trends relating to statistics on adolescent SRH. Large-scale health surveys, public health institutions, and academic research studies are utilized to gather data. Since 2009, teen birth rates in the United States have been declining and is 13.6 births per 1,000 females as of 2022. This rate remains higher than in other similar industrialized countries.

While U.S. constitutional law provides a clear basis to reject Tennessee’s attempt to silence individuals providing information about safe and lawful healthcare access, affirming the district court’s holding would also align with international human rights law. Several international treaties, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (“ICCPR”) and the International Convention on the Rights of the Child (“CRC”), support the position that the Recruitment Provision violates longstanding international legal principles protecting free speech.

We the undersigned 115 reproductive health, rights, and justice organizations are dedicated to the protection and realization of human rights for all people, and we are deeply concerned about the United States Government’s decision to withdraw from the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process, an unprecedented step that signals a worrying retreat from our human rights obligations and the global mechanisms of accountability.

Our coalition recently developed a joint submission to the UN Human Rights Council before the USA’s upcoming 4th Universal Periodic Review. This submission focused on the significant deterioration of sexual and reproductive rights and justice across the country since the elimination of a federal right to abortion and amid a broader undermining of rights in the USA.

As the United States (“US”) approaches its 4th Universal Periodic Review (“UPR”), individuals’ sexual and reproductive health and rights have significantly deteriorated across the country, particularly with regard to abortion and related healthcare. Following the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization,1 a growing number of states have implemented complete bans or aggressive restrictions on abortion, resulting in millions without access to care. Many seeking care, particularly in the South, are now forced to travel long(er) distances, seek medication through additional formal and informal means, or continue pregnancies against their will. Simultaneously, states are increasingly hostile to and criminalizing abortion seekers and providers, third parties who help individuals access care, and/or circumstances surrounding pregnancy, with laws that impose harsh penalties including fines, prosecution, and imprisonment.