The Pentagon will now use taxpayer money to transport troops and their dependents who seek abortions while based in states where abortion is illegal.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin wrote that “we have heard concerns from many of our Service members and their families about the complexity and the uncertainty that they now face in accessing reproductive health care, including abortion services.”

He continued, “I am committed to the Department taking all appropriate action, within its authority and consistent with appropriate action… to ensure that our Service members and their families can access reproductive health care and our health care providers can operate effectively.”

The Defense Secretary explained that he is directing the Department of Defense (DOD) to “establish additional privacy protections” surrounding abortions and “develop a program to reimburse applicable fees … [for] health care providers who wish to become licensed in a different state than that in which they are currently licensed” in order to perform abortions.

He also wrote that he is directing the department to “develop a program to support [DOD] health care providers who are subject to … civil or criminal penalties or loss of license or reprimand” for performing an abortion.

Additionally, he directed the DOD to “establish travel and transportation allowances for Service members and their dependents … to facilitate official travel to access non-covered reproductive health care that is unavailable within the local area of a Service member’s permanent duty station.”

Responding to the news, the director of communications for Texas Alliance for Life, Amy O’Donnell, told The Dallas Express, “It’s unfortunate that pro-abortion extremist President Joe Biden seeks to find ways to further the deaths of innocent unborn babies in their mothers’ wombs up to birth at taxpayers’ expense rather than advocate for tangible ways to support women in planned or unplanned pregnancies.”

“We have seen Governor Abbot and the Texas Legislature prioritize supporting women in Texas very well,” she continued. “Honestly [Biden’s] views are out of touch with the vast majority of voters as we’ve seen in the latest New York Times/Sienna poll, and it appears there is no shortage of ways that administration will seek to provide abortion-on-demand, up to birth, and again, at taxpayer expense.”

Following the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022) which ruled that “there is no constitutional right to abortion,” Texas laws have largely banned the abortion of unborn children except in narrow circumstances.

Currently, over 115,000 active-duty military personnel are stationed in Texas, with only California and Virginia hosting more.