President Donald Trump and his administration are restoring a religious liberty office dismantled under former President Joe Biden. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced on Monday that it is reorganizing its Office of Civil Rights (OCR) and establishing three divisions: the Conscience and Religious Freedom Division, the Civil Rights Division, and the Health Information Privacy, Data, and Cybersecurity Division. The Conscience and Religious Freedom Division was originally established by Trump in 2018, during his first term. Under Biden and his Health Secretary, new California gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra (D), the division was eliminated.
“This reorganization restores the HHS Civil Rights Division and the Conscience and Religious Freedom Division and strengthens the Office for Civil Rights’ ability to defend religious liberty, enforce conscience protections, and combat unlawful discrimination,” Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said in a statement. He added, “Under President Trump’s leadership, HHS will defend these rights with clarity, accountability, and resolve.” HHS OCR Director Paula M. Stannard said, “This reorganization reinstitutes a structure that rightly prioritizes civil rights and conscience and religious freedom alongside health information privacy and security.” She observed, “All three areas are deserving of subject-matter expertise and distinct senior executive leadership for OCR to best serve the American people.”
According to an HHS press release, the Conscience and Religious Freedom Division is charged with protecting “the fundamental and unalienable rights of conscience and religious freedom” and will “advance the protection of conscience rights, address race-based discrimination in a color-blind manner, eradicate antisemitism and anti-Christian bias, and restore biological truth.”
The Washington Stand has learned that the Conscience and Religious Freedom Division will “serve as a headquarters-level division dedicated to advancing voluntary compliance by regulated entities with federal statutes and regulations related to conscience and religious freedom in health and human services,” according to an HHS official. While the official policies and mechanism of the Conscience and Religious Freedom Division have yet to be formally announced, they division’s work is expected to protect pro-life Americans and American Christians from being pressured or coerced into participating in abortions, gender transition procedures, and other procedures which conflict with a biblical worldview.
“The Division will stand for the principle that it is fundamentally unfair to coerce, treat differently, persecute, or penalize an individual or organization for acting in accord with its religious or moral beliefs when those actions constitute protected conduct under Federal law,” the HHS official told The Washington Stand. “Many providers of health care and human services are motivated by their religious beliefs or moral convictions, and they should not be driven out of Federal programs because of those convictions.”
In comments to The Washington Stand, Mary Szoch, Director of the Center for Human Dignity at Family Research Council, said, “I’m so grateful to the Trump administration for prioritizing the conscience rights and religious liberty of all Americans — especially health care workers. Allowing health care workers to follow their consciences results in better care for everyone, and it allows more people to join the healthcare profession.” She added, “My hope is that the work of this office will result in a greater respect for human dignity and religious freedom around the country.”
According to a lengthy report from the Department of Justice (DOJ) published late last month, the Biden administration weaponized numerous government agencies — including HHS — to violate conscience and religious liberty rights, especially those of American Christians. Under the Biden administration, HHS imposed new rules for gender transition procedures for minors, centralizing the religious exemption process and often denying religious or conscience exemptions, according to the report. The Biden HHS also reinterpreted the 1986 Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) to require hospitals and emergency rooms to commit “emergency” abortions, without regard for conscience or religious exemptions.
Another DOJ report confirmed that the Biden administration routinely collaborated with abortion industry activists to unfairly target pro-life Americans, including aggressively prosecuting pro-lifers charged with violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act and requesting maximum sentencing for non-violent offenses, while failing or refusing to prosecute pro-abortion activists charged with FACE Act violations for targeting pro-life pregnancy resource centers and churches.
S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand, a news division of the Family Research Council.
