As discussed in my previous post, frames are a helpful tool for assessing the motivations of actors in a particular scenario. Framing is a major topic of discussion in the literature of both social movements (such as the pro-life movement) and public policy. In the social movements literature, frames are strategic, conscious, intentional, cognitive attempts at coalition-building. In the public policy literature, “intractable policy controversies” arise when policymakers differently define the reality of the situation based on their ‘incommensurable’ views and values. These different policy frames make policy actors unable to agree on the facts of the situation and enabled them to “argue past each other” (95). Policy positions then rest on frames, “underlying structures of belief, perception, and appreciation” (23).
Policy actors using different frames construct different policy problems which necessitate different policy solutions. For example, people using the fetal personhood frame believe life begins at conception and view fetuses as people; for people using this frame, abortion would be tantamount to murder (policy problem) and thus should be made illegal (policy solution). Conversely, people using a gender and class equity frame tend to argue that abortion restrictions constrain women’s economic opportunities (policy problem) and thus the bans should be repealed (policy solution).
In my past work on the Trump administration’s 2019 rule change to the Title X federal family planning program, I used framing analysis to examine three sets of textual data related to the rule change: a Congressional hearing about the rule change, 12 documents from the White House press office about the rule change, and 100 public comments submitted to Regulations.gov about the proposed rule.
In this post, I will give an overview of the fetal personhood frame, a resurgent frame that was falling out of favor with the pro-life movement but is making a notable comeback. I will then discuss how the frame is being used today and how it may be used in the future.
The Fetal Personhood Frame
As discussed last week, the framing of abortion has been incredibly contentious throughout U.S. history. The dominant frame used by the pro-life movement throughout the 20th century was the fetal personhood frame. The fetal personhood frame asserts that because life begins at conception, fetuses are people who are entitled to the full rights of personhood. This allows pro-life activists to assert that abortion is tantamount to murder. This frame has been rejected by the judiciary in a significant number of cases, most notably Roe v. Wade, leaving the frame to activists and lawmakers hoping to make emotional and cultural appeals. Those using the fetal personhood frame often focus on the fetus’s ‘right to life,’ characterize fetuses as ‘babies’ that need to be ‘saved’ and use strategic visual imagery such as pictures of mutilated fetuses or pictures of a fetus’s feet, which develop a resemblance to infant feet early into pregnancy.
Around the turn of the 21st century, as contraception and abortion were steadily gaining public support, the pro-life movement began shifting focus away from the fetus and towards the woman carrying it. Accused for decades of being against women’s rights, the pro-life movement began to reframe and rebrand themselves as pro-woman. Arguing that abortions were dangerous, often coercive, and had long-lasting physical and emotional consequences (such as post-abortion syndrome), pro-life activists began lobbying for abortion restrictions in the name of ‘protecting women.’ A product of gender paternalism, this pro-woman frame offered “strategic opportunities for anti-abortion lawmakers to appear softer and more reasonable than the violent anti-abortion movement of the past” (208). While some activists continued using the fetal personhood frame in conjunction with the pro-woman frame (for example, “love them both” campaigns), the pro-woman frame became the dominant frame of pro-life activists and lawmakers in the 2000s and 2010s. In her analysis of 1,706 state-level abortion restrictions proposed in all 50 states from 2008-2017, Amanda Roberti found significant adoption of the pro-woman frame by antiabortion lawmakers: the pro-woman frame was used in 70% of state abortion restrictions while just 38% of the restrictions used the fetal personhood frame.
My Analysis
In my analysis of documents related to the 2019 Title X rule change, the fetal personhood frame was used significantly more than expected. While some supporters of the rule change did prefer to use the pro-woman frame to express their support for the rule, it was used significantly less than expected in all three sets of documents. Generally preferring the fetal personhood frame, the White House in particular was not at all interested in the pro-woman frame. This heavy use of the fetal personhood frame was inconsistent with previous findings that the frame was falling out of favor.
Elements of the frame were used in 43% of public comments in support of the rule change, with many characterizing fetuses as babies and describing in detail how abortions were “killing babies.” This focus on ‘murder’ and ‘killing babies’ illustrated a collective problem definition for which the only solution was completely eliminating abortion. For instance, one supportive commenter wrote: “I support the new rule for title X funding because abortion is homicide. It is the murder of a human being and I do not want my government using my tax money to support this horrible practice.” Commenters using this frame often celebrated the rule change as a victory and thanked President Trump for his work, with one writing: “I’m so thankful for our pro-life President.”
The White House also used the fetal personhood frame in a majority of the documents analyzed, significantly more than expected. Like the public comments, the documents repeatedly characterized fetuses as babies or children and referenced the ‘sanctity of life,’ ‘the unborn,’ and ‘the innocent,’ often in the context of needing protection. The President also expressed thanks for the work of the pro-life movement in preventing “the deaths of innocent unborn children” and asked “every citizen of this great Nation to listen to the sound of silence caused by a generation lost to us, and then to raise their voices for all those affected by abortion, both seen and unseen.” In stark contrast, supporters of the rule change in the Congressional committee hearing did not reference fetal personhood once. While they were more likely to use the pro-woman frame than the fetal personhood frame, supporters of the rule change in Congress were mostly focused on ‘compliance with statutory intent,’ sticking to HHS’s definition of the policy problem and its inherent solution.
The prevalent use of the fetal personhood frame by President Trump, the White House, and his supporters provides an interesting glimpse at how Trump as a figurehead may have shaped the abortion debate. As mentioned above, Amanda Roberti found legislators used the pro-woman frame in a majority of abortion restrictions from 2008-2017 and argued that this frame transformation represented a “strategic tactic of anti-abortion legislators to soften political behavior and beliefs that are seen as hostile toward women” (207). Supporters of the rule change in the Congressional hearing (2018) did prefer the pro-woman frame over the fetal personhood frame. However, in the White House documents (2018-2021) and supportive public comments (2018) I analyzed, supporters of the rule change used the fetal personhood frame dramatically more often than the pro-woman frame. This could indicate one of two things: either the frame transformation Roberti described never fully reached the rank and file of the pro-life movement, or we’re seeing a frame regression from the pro-woman frame back to the fetal personhood frame in some groups. This frame regression could indicate that President Trump, his administration, and his supporters in the pro-life movement care less about the appearance of softness and civility than the state lawmakers Roberti studied. Thus, President Trump as a figurehead may have inspired, enabled, or stoked a return to the harsher, more violent days of the pro-life movement’s past. The vocabularies used in the public comments and White House documents I analyzed were remarkably similar, suggesting that President Trump and his supporters were moving in lock step on this issue.
Use of the Frame Today
In the years since my analysis, the conservative resurrection and readoption of the fetal personhood frame has only become more widespread. Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization which overturned Roe v. Wade’s constitutional protections for abortion, conservative and right-leaning lawmakers are pushing further restrictions on contraception and abortion access across the country. In the wake of Dobbs, more than half of U.S. states have enacted abortion restrictions, many based on fetal personhood.
When put into law, fetal personhood formalizes that life begins at conception. This may endanger access to IVF and other fertility services by declaring that fertilized embryos should be legally considered children. Laws based on fetal personhood may also criminalize pregnancy loss; 38 states have ‘feticide’ laws authorizing law enforcement to bring homicide charges against those who have caused the loss of a pregnancy. While most of these states have language prohibiting the pregnant person from being charged for the loss of their own pregnancy, some may still be prosecuted for other crimes due to rights granted to a fetus through fetal personhood, such as child abuse, neglect, or endangerment, chemical endangerment causing death, or concealing the death of another person. Since Dobbs, miscarriages and stillbirths have been criminally investigated in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Georgia, Ohio, Oklahoma, and South Carolina. In the first year after the decision, there were at least 210 pregnancy-related prosecutions, nearly half of which took place in Alabama.
Fetal Personhood in Project 2025
In Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s plan for President Trump and his administration, the number one goal for the Department of Health and Human Services is “Protecting Life, Conscience, and Bodily Integrity.” The plan states that the Secretary of HHS “should pursue a robust agenda to protect the fundamental right to life.” The plan elaborates this point with additional frame buzzwords; “From the moment of conception, every human being possesses inherent dignity and worth, and our humanity does not depend on our age, stage of development, race, or abilities. The Secretary must ensure that all HHS programs and activities are rooted in a deep respect for innocent human life from day one until natural death: Abortion and euthanasia are not health care” (450, emphasis added).
Project 2025 further describes “The Life Agenda,” writing: “The Office of the Secretary should eliminate the HHS Reproductive Healthcare Access Task Force and install a pro-life task force to ensure that all of the department’s divisions seek to use their authority to promote the life and health of women and their unborn children. Additionally, HHS should return to being known as the Department of Life by explicitly rejecting the notion that abortion is health care and by restoring its mission statement under the Strategic Plan and elsewhere to include furthering the health and well-being of all Americans “from conception to natural death”” (489, emphasis added).
Project 2025 also calls for prohibiting Planned Parenthood from receiving Medicaid funds (471), a key stipulation of the recently passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act. This provision was temporarily blocked by a U.S. District Judge after Planned Parenthood sued the administration, and a 14-day temporary restraining order was filed on July 7, 2025. Despite this temporary restraining order, some Planned Parenthood locations have already stopped accepting Medicaid patients.
Looking Forward
A majority of voters, including 41% of Republicans, oppose giving legal rights to embryos and fetuses. While most voters surveyed were not initially familiar with fetal personhood, opposition to these types of laws increased as voters received more information about them. Two-thirds of voters were very concerned about criminalizing miscarriages and nearly six in ten were very concerned about rights conveyed to a fetus preventing pregnant people from receiving emergency healthcare. Fetal personhood is an unpopular gambit by the pro-life movement and far-right Republicans, and it will likely only become more unpopular as voters’ concerns about criminalizing miscarriages continue to materialize.