Planned Parenthood has announced that it is going on the offensive in the ongoing fight to expand reproductive rights across the United States with a new “sweeping plan” to challenge the Trump administration as well as anti-choice activists and lawmakers by proposing policies to make sexual education more inclusive and increase access to healthcare such as birth control and abortion.

“Everyone deserves the freedom and opportunity to control their lives at the most basic level, including access to birth control, quality sex education, and safe, legal abortion.”
—Dawn Laguens,
Planned Parenthood 

“The Trump-Pence administration has been attacking our patients, fundamental rights, and access to healthcare, emboldening state politicians to follow its reckless lead,” declared Planned Parenthood’s executive vice president Dawn Laguens. “We need to do more than just fight against the bad policies—now is the time to push for good ones.”

The so-called religious freedom agenda pushed by President Donald Trump and and Vice President Mike Pence—which has produced highly contentious policies that critics say give healthcare providers, employers, and others a #LicenseToDiscriminate—has been met with fierce protests and strengthened alliances between advocates for reproductive healthcare and LGBTQ rights, which could prove useful as Planned Parenthood’s new initiative evolves.

“We’re going on the offense. We’ve been marching, mobilizing, and organizing—and now we’re channeling that into real policy change,” Laguens added. “Together with our partners, we are moving forward to fight for people’s health and rights, state by state, bill by bill.”

This week, the group will work to advance policies in Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Tennessee, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia, according to a statement outlining the initiative. Particular attention will be paid to expanding healthcare access for communities of color, immigrants, and LGBTQ individuals, and combatting “systemic barriers” such as “poverty, lack of transportation, lack of paid sick leave, lack of childcare, lack of insurance, the risk of detention and deportation, and a historical distrust of the medical community.”