The same party that prides itself on protecting life and putting children first is pushing through Congress the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill.” This bill, which Republicans narrowly passed through the House in May and are now considering in the Senate, not only guts social safety nets like Medicaid and SNAP but also makes it easier to expand fossil fuel operations, poisoning the environment people need to raise children in the first place.
This bill violates the very foundation of reproductive rights as defined by organizations like SisterSong. Reproductive justice isn’t only about the right to have or not have children. It’s also about the right to raise those children in safe, healthy, and sustainable communities.
What kind of future are we being offered when air pollution is now the No. 2 killer of children under five around the world? What’s more, there’s growing evidence that exposure to exhaust fumes can harm reproductive health. Just living on a busy street means inhaling harmful air pollution. And exposure to fossil fuel byproducts is linked to infertility and miscarriage.
As a middle school teacher, I’m terrified of what my students’ lives will look like when they reach my age – and I’m only 26. I watch them try to focus on math and science while the world they’re inheriting is actively being burned to the ground by people in power. They deserve better than this.
Under the proposed legislation, the methane fee, established in 2022 and intended to curb one of the most potent climate-warming gases, would be paused for 10 years, meaning polluters wouldn’t have to worry about paying it until 2035. That’s a decade of inaction while the world races toward a breaking point. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, we have six years at 2024 emissions levels before global temperatures are likely to surpass 1.5°C – though some scientists argue we are already crossing that threshold. As if 1.5°C wasn’t alarming enough, every tenth of a degree increase brings increased risks of catastrophic floods, droughts, and wildfires.
Stripping the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulations wasn’t enough for this administration. After the agency’s leadership publicly mocked climate science, the new bill now proposes allowing gas pipeline developers to skip environmental permitting entirely if they can afford a $10 million fee. At the same time, the bill calls for slashing Medicaid, a program that supports roughly 20% of Americans and covers over 40% of births in the country, along with prenatal and postpartum care. In short, the government is subsidizing polluters while stripping health care from families.
We aren’t just losing environmental protections. We are losing lives. That’s not beautiful. It’s brutal.
Since lawmakers are suddenly so concerned about the U.S. birth rate, with Vice President JD Vance declaring he “wants more babies in the United States of America,” maybe they should focus on making sure there is a world worth bringing children into.
Natalia Arcos Cano is an educator and Public Voices fellow of the OpEd Project with the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice and the Every Page Foundation.
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