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The Department of Veterans Affairs’ newest policy promising to use American tax dollars to fund the creation of motherless and fatherless children via in vitro fertilization for single and same-sex veterans raises “a plethora of ethical concerns and questions,” four members of the House Freedom Caucus say.
In a letter to Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough, Republican Reps. Matt Rosendale, Mary Miller, Bob Good, and Josh Brecheen penned “very strong objections” to the new policy due to the fertility industry’s longstanding immoral and unethical practices.
“The new VA policy is shocking not only on a moral level, but on a political and legal level as well,” the Republicans wrote.
The VA previously limited taxpayer-funded assisted reproductive technology to service members and veterans who married to someone of the opposite sex, could use his own gametes, and had received an infertility diagnosis linked to injury, illness, or a service-connected disability. It wasn’t until an abortion and transgender activist group brought a lawsuit against the Pentagon and the Department of Veterans Affairs that the federal agencies changed their tune.
Under the new ART policy, which the Department of Defense also sought to adopt, the VA will “offer IVF benefits to qualifying Veterans regardless of marital status and – for the first time – allow the use of donor eggs, sperm, and embryos.” McDonough claimed the changes have “long been a priority for us” and promised the VA “expects to be ready to deliver this care to Veterans nationwide
