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In the wake of the Supreme Court overruling Roe v. Wade, the Pentagon announced Thursday that it will provide travel funding and approval for troops and their dependents to seek abortions outside of the states where they are based and where abortion is now illegal.
The moves are intended to address concerns about whether the U.S. military would be able to provide support to female service members who could be forced to travel away from the states where they were based in order to seek a legal abortion.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued a memo on Thursday outlining new policies that will be put in place later this year. They are an outgrowth of a review of existing Defense Department policies that Austin had ordered following the Supreme Court’s decision in June.
The new policies will increase protections for the privacy of those involved and provide legal guarantees to military health care providers, who carry out the limited number of abortions covered by the Hyde Amendment, in states where abortion is not legal.
The military services already provide leave time to service members who have to travel for abortions, but the new policies will make it possible for service members to get the time off and be reimbursed for the travel costs to an out-of-state health care provider.
