NASHVILLE (BP) — The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) sent a letter Tuesday (Nov. 12) to the Trump transition team advocating for changes to pro-life and religious liberty measures taken under the Biden administration.

“This letter highlights five critical policy actions that reflect deeply held values for Southern Baptists and warrant the incoming administration’s immediate attention during President Trump’s first 100 days in office,” ERLC President Brent Leatherwood wrote. “All of these options represent positive opportunities to shape public policy in helpful and constructive ways at the outset of a second term that we believe merit strong consideration for inclusion in President Trump’s initial agenda.”

The letter was addressed to Howard Lutnick and Linda McMahon, named by the president-elect to lead his transition team. Lutnick is the longtime CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, a financial services firm. McMahon helped build World Wrestling Entertainment into a multi-billion-dollar business before serving in Trump’s first administration as head of the Small Business Administration.

The five requests issued by the ERLC are:

• Reinforce policies that ensure the government does not fund abortion.
• Withhold government funding for abortion providers, domestically and abroad.
• Revoke President Joe Biden’s executive order directing agencies to implement radical gender and sexuality policies.
• Rescind the anti-life, anti-religious liberty and pro-gender ideology policies advanced by the Biden administration.
• Reverse the Biden administration’s actions that expanded access to the abortion pill.

Government should not fund abortion

In March the ERLC celebrated inclusion of the Hyde Amendment and other pro-life legislation in the federal budget that ran through Sept. 30. Trump’s first term “continually reaffirmed” such provisions ensuring taxes did not fund abortions, the letter said.

“By issuing an executive order committing to full enforcement of the Hyde Amendment, President Trump will usher in a renewed focus on protecting life and the deeply-held religious beliefs of taxpayers from government overreach,” it continued.

Trump’s platform puts the onus of abortion regulation on the states. It also opposes late term abortion, “while supporting mothers and policies that advance Prenatal Care, access to Birth Control and [fertility treatments].”

No funding for international, domestic abortion providers

Title X policies that bar government-funded domestic or international entities from performing or counseling for abortions should be protected. This includes reinstating the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance Policy.

That policy was originally instituted in 1984 by President Ronald Reagan. Biden rescinded it soon after taking office.

Revoke executive order over agency hiring practices for gender, sexuality

Biden signed 17 executive orders on his first day in office in January 2021. Among them was one calling for an end to discrimination in federal agencies over gender identity and sexuality.

The ERLC said at the time that Biden’s order “dramatically expands the scope” of a Supreme Court decision the previous year. That decision expanded the category of “sex” in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights act to apply to homosexual and transgender employees.

In its letter Thursday (Nov. 12), the ERLC asked the incoming Trump administration to undo the “harmful” directive, saying the new policies violated the religious liberty of those supporting biblical views of sexuality and gender.

Rescind anti-religious liberty federal rules

Several policies of the Biden administration worked around the responsibilities of parents to educate their children in regard to sexuality, the ERLC said.

Among those was a rule change to the Affordable Care Act that can force medical professionals to perform or insurance providers to cover “gender transition services” against their “moral, religious and professional judgment.”

Hannah Daniel, the ERLC’s policy manager, told Baptist Press at the time that the rule “shows a complete disregard for the legitimate moral, religious and medical concerns of health care professionals and insurance providers surrounding gender transition services, and the ERLC urges the department to withdraw this harmful rule.”

The ERLC also requests that Trump’s team undo rules that redefine Title IX to include sexual orientation and gender identity. In August the Supreme Court rejected an emergency request from the Biden administration requiring states to enforce new Title IX measures that many said would turn back the clock on female sports. 

Other Biden policies called potential and current foster parents with biblical beliefs regarding sexuality and gender into question over their ability to provide a “safe and proper” home for children identifying as LGBTQ. Would-be foster parents say they were rejected from fostering because of these rules. Others, including a Southern Baptist pastor in Vermont, say their existing foster home license was canceled because of their faith.

Reverse expanded access to abortion pill

The Biden administration took steps to expand access to the abortion drug mifepristone, which has overtaken surgical abortion as the most common method of terminating a pregnancy.

“The ERLC looks forward to the day the abortion pill is prohibited entirely and asks the Trump administration, at a minimum, to reverse these actions which have cost preborn lives and threatened the health and safety of women,” the ERLC said.

(EDITOR’S NOTE — Scott Barkley is chief national correspondent for Baptist Press.)