Editor’s note: This is the final edition of the Washington Roundup. We are transitioning to a new Washington-based weekly analysis by Kate Scanlon that will provide insight into what is happening at the nexus of the federal government and the Catholic Church’s priorities and concerns. We will be on hiatus the next few weeks as we prepare for the debut of the new format, complete with a new name, after Labor Day. We’re sure you will enjoy it.
WASHINGTON (OSV News) — While Congress was in the midst of its August recess, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced she would step down from her podium at the end of the month.
The same week, Vice President JD Vance and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services accused dozens of hospitals and other providers on Aug. 13 of improperly billing for certain types of medical or surgical gender reassignment procedures for minors who identify as transgender.
Meanwhile, three states carried out executions in one day, prompting a message of grave concern from Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, who is also president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Leavitt to step down as press secretary
Leavitt will leave the administration at the end of the month, she and President Donald Trump announced Aug. 12 on social media.
Trump said Leavitt, 28, the youngest person to be White House press secretary, will step down to “spend more time with her beautiful young children and family.”
“Karoline will now be one of my top outside advisors, and an influential voice within the Republican Party, as we work to defy History, and conclusively win the Midterm Elections,” Trump wrote in a post on his social media website, Truth Social.
Leavitt, who is also Catholic, gave birth to her second child in May.
“Being a mother and welcoming a new baby while working in one of the most demanding jobs in the world has been the most rewarding yet challenging season of my life, to say the least,” Leavitt wrote in a post on X. “The truth is since returning to the White House after the birth of my daughter, I have felt in my heart that I cannot be the best mom my two young children deserve while devoting the constant time, energy, and attention required of the White House Press Secretary — and that is why I have ultimately made the bittersweet decision to depart the White House and embark on a new chapter in my life.”
But she added, “President Trump has asked me to continue serving as a top advisor to him on the outside, and I will always remain a vocal advocate for MAGA and the Republican Party.”
The announcement came just a few months ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. It also came shortly after a Washington Post report the same week that an Iranian assassination threat against Trump prompted Trump to secretly return from Turkey on a military aircraft while the White House said he was on Air Force One with White House staffers and journalists.
Vance calls for DOJ investigation into hospitals over billing for transgender procedures
In a report titled “Wolves in White Coats: How Doctors and Hospitals Pushed and Profited from the Fraud of ‘Gender Medicine,'” HHS accused more than 225 hospitals and health systems of establishing what it called “pediatric gender programs.” They alleged some used a generic billing code for endocrine disorders to mask gender reassignment efforts.
In a video posted on X, Vance said they referred their allegations to the HHS Office of Inspector General and the Justice Department for investigation.
“These allegations are crazy, and they demand investigation,” Vance said.
Vance argued in the post on X that “some hospitals and healthcare providers have been subjecting children to horrific, experimental treatments in service of radical gender ideologies.”
Planned Parenthood affiliates were among the entities named in the report, but the report said that “in each case a prescriber wrote a cross-sex hormone prescription for a patient recorded as a minor, in a state restricting sex-rejecting procedures for minors. No claim connects that patient to a visit at a Planned Parenthood facility on any date. These affiliates appear because the prescriber billed at least 95% of their claims to the affiliate in the year of the prescription and is registered at one of its addresses. The connection is therefore the prescriber’s billing pattern, not a record of the encounter.”
Three states carry out executions in one day
Tennessee, Alabama and Oklahoma each carried out executions on Aug. 13, marking the first time since 2010 three people were put to death on the same day in the United States.
In a statement posted on X, Archbishop Coakley said he was “disheartened as the State of Oklahoma continues along an ominous path, carrying out executions with a frequency and regularity that places it among the nation’s leaders with such a dubious distinction.”
As of 12 p.m. EDT on Aug. 14, 22 prisoners have been executed in 6 states in the U.S. in 2026, according to the Death Penalty Information Center’s database, with most of those executions taking place in Florida.
“Let us all pray and work for a more humane form of justice, one that maintains a hope for redemption and maintains respect for the God-given dignity of each life, even for those who have committed a grave crime,” Archbishop Coakley said.
“Of course, great concern and compassion is vital for the victims and their families, as they contend with incredible grief in the aftermath of heinous crimes,” he continued. “There’s a need to pray for healing for those families, accompanying them when possible. There’s a need, too, to pray for the perpetrators, remembering that human life is a gift from God and the right to life cannot be erased, even for those guilty of severe crimes.”
Capital punishment, he argued, “does not provide justice. Our modern prisons are secure. Life imprisonment offers assurance that citizens are not at risk. And it allows for a conversion of hearts.”
Florida is scheduled to carry out another execution on Aug. 18.
Kate Scanlon is a national reporter for OSV News covering Washington. Follow her on X @kgscanlon.
