Trump May Shut Down Gender Ideology at UNICEF/Euros Rattled

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UNITED NATIONS, June 13 (C-Fam) The Trump administration may force the UN agency for children to hit the pause button on sexualizing children, promoting abortion, and gender ideology. Europeans want the agency to ignore the administration.

The new strategic plan of UNICEF was discussed by the executive board of the agency this week. As a result of pressure from the Trump administration, the draft of the new plan no longer has language promoting sexual and reproductive health and rights for children that was controversially included in the previous strategic plan. The draft also scaled back language promoting gender ideology.

The U.S. said the agency had not gone far enough in distancing itself from its work to promote these issues. Europeans protested that these issues must be priorities for the agency.

“We are strongly opposed to the current draft of the strategic plan due to references to concepts like diversity, equity, and Inclusion, gender ideology, and abortion,” a U.S. representative said.

The U.S. asked the agency to focus on its “core mandate” and avoid controversial social issues. The U.S. also encouraged the agency to respect the “vital role” of the family in the life of children and the authority of parents as “key” on matters such as sex education.

“President Trump believes that parents, both mothers and fathers, know how to best raise their children and create a thriving society. We firmly believe that harmful gender ideology, including comprehensive sexuality education, is detrimental to the well-being and development of children, especially usurping basic parental authority,” the U.S. delegate said.

The U.S. statement also emphasized the Trump administration’s categorical opposition to “horrid” transgender policies for children. “Under the Trump Administration, it is the policy of the United States that it will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called ‘transition’ of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures,” he said.

Of note, the U.S. statement also emphasized “there is no international right to abortion.”

Europeans reacted negatively to the agency’s attempt to placate the Trump administration. They told the agency they expected it to continue its work on gender, sexual and reproductive health and rights, sex education, and LGBT issues for children, regardless of the U.S. position.

Sweden, speaking on behalf of Nordic countries said it was “essential” that UNICEF continue its work on these issues as “operational priorities.”

Representatives from Germany, the Netherlands, and the European Union emphasized the need for the agency to keep working on gender issues, sexual and reproductive health and rights, and to “leave no one behind”, a code phrase used to promote LGBT issues in the working documents of the UNICEF.

Canada expressly called on the agency to keep embedding “gender equality, as well as diversity, equity, inclusion, and access” across all its work, calling this a “powerful investment” that “fuels economic growth, strengthens democracy, and fosters peace and resilience.”

The debate about the strategic plan shows how much Trump’s pro-life diplomacy is disrupting the ability of UN agencies to promote controversial social issues. The agencies are having to claw back controversial policies for fear of losing U.S. funding. The U.S. government is the largest government donor to UNICEF, providing close to $1.4 billion annually to the agency. The private U.S. fund for UNICEF contributes a further $372 million.

UNICEF was one of the first UN agencies to streamline gender ideology, access to sexual and reproductive health for children, comprehensive sexuality education, and even LGBT policies for children. These became priorities for the agency during the Obama administration. Now, it is at the forefront of efforts to teach children about sex without parental involvement, including explicit video instructions through online resources, apps, and AI, like the UNICEF-authored program LAAHA. In 2021, reporting by the Friday Fax forced the agency to take down a publication promoting pornography use by children as normal and harmless.

 

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