WASHINGTON (OSV News) — The White House Dec. 9 rejected a call from a national pro-life organization for U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary to be fired.
The pro-life group argued Makaray has “slow-walked a promised safety study of women’s real-world experiences taking abortion drugs.”
Generic form of mifepristone
Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, which works to elect pro-life candidates to public office, was among the pro-life groups that criticized Makary and the FDA over its recent approval of a new generic form of mifepristone — a pill commonly, but not exclusively, used for early abortion.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, the group’s president, said in a statement, “Enough is enough” and that Makary “should be fired immediately.”
“The FDA is doing nothing while every single day abortion drugs take the lives of children, put women and girls at serious risk, empower abusers and trample state pro-life laws,” she said. “The FDA needs a new commissioner who will immediately reinstate in-person dispensing as it existed under President (Donald) Trump’s first term and immediately conduct a comprehensive study.”
Makary ‘is working diligently’
Kush Desai, a spokesman for the White House, said in written comments provided to OSV News that Makary “is working diligently to ensure that Americans have the best possible, Gold Standard Science study of mifepristone.”
“The White House maintains the utmost confidence in Commissioner Makary, whose leadership at the FDA has delivered and continues to deliver one landmark victory for the American people after another, from cracking down on artificial ingredients in our food supply to conducting the first safety review of baby formula in decades,” Desai said. “Uninformed attacks against Commissioner Makary from individuals outside the Administration will not change these facts.”
In response to a request for comment sent to the FDA, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the FDA, said in written comments provided to OSV News, “FDA takes the time necessary to conduct comprehensive scientific reviews, and that is what Dr. Makary is ensuring as part of the Department’s commitment to gold-standard science and evidence-based reviews.”
‘Enforce pro-life protections’
Dannenfelser further argued that Makary “is severely undermining President Trump and Vice President Vance’s pro-life credentials and their position that states should have the right to enact and enforce pro-life protections. Makary must go.”
During his third Republican bid for the White House, Trump argued that abortion should be a matter for the states rather than Congress, and said he would veto a federal abortion ban if one reached his desk. On several occasions, Trump has blamed the issue of abortion and pro-life voters for the Republican Party’s underperformance in the 2022 midterm election cycle.
Vice President JD Vance said during the campaign that Trump supported access to mifepristone.
2025 March for Life
Just a few days after taking office in January, both Trump and Vance addressed the March for Life — the president by video and the vice president in person.
Both Makary and Kennedy have faced scrutiny from pro-life members of Congress after the approval of the new generic despite previous suggestions that mifepristone would undergo a review. But Bloomberg reported Dec. 8 Makary stalled that review.
The Catholic Church teaches that all human life is sacred from conception to natural death, and as such, opposes direct abortion.
Approved by the FDA for early abortion in 2000, mifepristone — the first of two drugs used in a medication-based abortion — gained the moniker “the abortion pill.” However, the same drug combination has become used sometimes in recent years for miscarriage care, where an unborn child has already passed, a situation that Catholic teaching would hold as morally licit use.
Kate Scanlon is a national reporter for OSV News covering Washington. Follow her on X @kgscanlon.
