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For Immediate Release
March, 30 2016, 11:15am EDT
Contact:
Email:,center.press@reprorights.org
Updated FDA Label Better Reflects Evidence-Based Medicine, Could Expand Access to Medication Abortion
Change aligns Mifepristone label with current best medical practice and more than 15 years of scientific evidence
WASHINGTON
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced it intends to approve a change to the label for Mifepristone (known as Mifeprex(r)), a drug used to end an early pregnancy, in order to better reflect current medical practice and years of scientific evidence.
This change has the potential to increase access to this safe option in the earliest weeks of pregnancy in states where medication abortion methods are subject to politically motivated restrictions that have forced physicians to prescribe Mifepristone according to the outdated, inferior, and less effective FDA label originally approved in 2000.
The Center for Reproductive Rights is currently working with our partners and health care providers in states across the country to determine the impact on women seeking medication abortion in light of this announcement.
Said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights:
"The FDA's approval of a label reflecting a more updated, evidence-based protocol for medication abortion has the potential to expand women's options for safely ending a pregnancy in the earliest weeks.
"This label change underscores just how medically unnecessary and politically motivated restrictions on medication abortion in states like Texas and Oklahoma truly are--and demonstrates the lengths politicians will go to single out reproductive health care to restrict women's rights.
"It's time to put an end to laws that let politics trump science and use underhanded means to attack a woman's constitutionally guaranteed right to safe, legal abortion."
The Center for Reproductive Rights has challenged unconstitutional restrictions on medication abortion in four states in the last few years. Restrictions challenged by the Center have been in effect in Texas and North Dakota since 2013 and 2014 respectively, while challenges to restrictions on medication abortion in Arizona and Oklahoma are currently enjoined as they move through the courts.
Women in the United States have been safely and legally using medication abortion for over nearly two decades, with approximately one in four women who make the decision to end a pregnancy in the first nine weeks choosing this method. Major medical groups oppose laws which severely restrict access to medication abortion. Both the American Medical Association (AMA) and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologist (ACOG) have submitted amicus briefs opposing restrictions on medication abortion in Arizona and Texas. These types of restrictions ignore years of doctor's practical experience and scientific advancement, forcing providers to prescribe the medications with an inferior, outdated, and less effective procedure.
The Center for Reproductive Rights is a global human rights organization of lawyers and advocates who ensure reproductive rights are protected in law as fundamental human rights for the dignity, equality, health, and well-being of every person.
(917) 637-3600LATEST NEWS
'We Cannot Stand Silent': Sheinbaum to Seek Criminal Charges Over ICE Detention Deaths
"We cannot turn a blind eye to the Mexicans who have died," said Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum.
Jul 10, 2026
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Thursday that her government intends to pursue criminal charges over the deaths of 17 Mexican nationals in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The Associated Press reported that Sheinbaum's administration will submit a request "to state prosecutors' offices and the US Department of Justice, asking them to consider criminal charges against those responsible for the deaths." The request, according to AP, "will be accompanied by civil lawsuits against the companies that operate the detention centers in an effort to put an end to human rights violations in those facilities."
Sheinbaum said her government decided to urgently move forward with its likely doomed push for accountability after an ICE agent killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston earlier this week. Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national, had been living in the US for more than three decades.
Mexico's president called the killing "sad and regrettable," arguing that it "appears to have been targeted."
"We are going to do everything in our power, because we cannot stand silent," Sheinbaum said Thursday. "We cannot turn a blind eye to the Mexicans who have died."
According to a recent report by Physicians for Human Rights and Human Rights Watch, "the mortality rate of deaths in ICE custody is at its highest level in over a decade and has more than doubled since [US President Donald] Trump’s second term began."
"The rate is nearly four times that of the Biden administration, and more than two and a half times as high as that of the first Trump administration," the report found, noting that a record 71,000 people were in immigration detention in January 2026. "The surge in deaths is much worse than what one would expect even considering the much higher number of people in detention."
Deaths in ICE custody have drawn international alarm, with the United Nations high commissioner for human rights saying last month that "the lack of transparency and clarity surrounding the circumstances of these deaths in custody undermines accountability for them."
“I call for prompt, independent, impartial and effective investigations into all deaths in ICE custody," said Volker Türk. "Those responsible for violations of the law must be held to account, and the rights of the victims’ families to truth, justice and reparation and guarantees of non-recurrence must be upheld."
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Troy Jackson Says He Would 'Never Vote’ for Military Aid to Israel if Elected to Senate
"Anybody with eyes and a heart knows the Israeli government is committing genocide in Gaza," the Maine Senate candidate said.
Jul 10, 2026
As he runs to take the place of Graham Platner as the Democratic US Senate nominee for Maine, former State Senate President Troy Jackson affirmed that he was in step with the majority of Democratic voters and would oppose sending military aid to Israel as it commits what he called a "genocide" in Gaza.
Jackson, a longtime labor activist who finished third in the Democratic gubernatorial primary last month, has been floated by many progressives as a fitting replacement for Platner, who suspended his campaign to unseat Republican Sen. Susan Collins this week following sexual assault allegations.
In his campaign announcement, Jackson hit many similar themes to Platner, who won the Democratic primary last month.
Jackson billed himself as a "progressive fighter" seeking to build a "powerful movement of working-class people" and emphasizing his support for Medicare for All and "tak[ing] on corporate power."
But some observers noted the absence of any mention of Gaza, which Platner emphasized heavily and which has become a central moral issue for many Democratic voters, who overwhelmingly oppose continued support for Israel as it commits what the majority feel is a genocide against Palestinians.
A review of Jackson's social media history showed that he had no posts about Gaza when he announced his campaign on Wednesday.
But following reports that an Israeli missile strike had killed a Palestinian aid worker who'd organized World Cup watch parties in Gaza, Jackson took the opportunity to make his stance clear.
"This is unconscionable," Jackson wrote on X. "Anybody with eyes and a heart knows the Israeli government is committing genocide in Gaza. It has to end, and we as Americans have the power to end it."
"When I'm in the US Senate," he continued, "I’ll never vote in favor of US taxpayer-funded military aid to Israel."
Other leading candidates, most of whom ran for governor, have expressed a range of opinions about Israel's conduct.
Nirav Shah, a physician who led the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention from 2019 to 2023 and finished second in the gubernatorial primary, has expressed a similarly strong stance that Israel was committing genocide and that he would support a full arms embargo and would refuse any campaign funding from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
Shenna Bellows, who came in fourth place in the governor's race and currently serves as Maine's secretary of state, has not publicly expressed a clear opinion on support for Israel, though in her 2014 Senate run against Collins, she advocated more generally for “deep cuts in defense spending” so public money could be directed toward domestic projects.
The progressive group Our Revolution, which has thrown its support behind Jackson, commended the candidate for taking a forthright stance.
"Troy Jackson doesn’t do word salad," the group said. "He calls a genocide a genocide and says he’ll never vote for taxpayer-funded military aid to fund it. That’s what Maine voters delivered a historic win for on June 9."
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Trump Admin Trying to Deport Witnesses Who Contradicted ICE Claims About Fatal Shooting
"ICE appears to have lied yet again about killing someone," said one immigration expert.
Jul 10, 2026
The controversy surrounding the killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by federal immigration enforcement officials is growing amid new reports that the Trump administration is trying to deport three witnesses to the the fatal shooting.
Juan Proaño, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said in a Thursday interview with The New Republic that the witnesses, all undocumented immigrants who were detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials after the shooting, are "being pressured to sign self-deportation orders."
"They’re currently in detention," said Proaño, who is serving as a representative for Salgado Araujo's family. "These men hold the key to what actually happened."
Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican national who ran a small construction business and had been living in the US for more than three decades, was pulled over by ICE officers in unmarked vehicles on Tuesday morning.
ICE officers claimed that Salgado Araujo, who was driving to work along with three coworkers, tried to evade arrest by ramming his car into them.
Purportedly fearing for his life, one ICE agent opened fire on Salgado Araujo and killed him, the officers said.
However, The Washington Post reported on Friday that all three men who were in the car with Salgado Araujo are strongly disputing the ICE agents' account of the deadly incident.
In fact, all three witnesses said that the ICE officer involved in the shooting opened fire immediately after exiting his vehicle, and that Salgado Araujo did not try to drive into him.
Detainee Jose Trinidad Rojas, 51, in a hand-written statement obtained by the Post through attorney Hugo Balderas-Ibarra, bluntly contradicted the ICE officers' claims.
"That is a lie,” Trinidad Rojas wrote. “It is impossible for them to say that they were going to get run over … there were no officers in front of or behind the vehicle. They were on the sides."
Balderas-Ibarra told the Post that he interviewed the other two men in the car, who both gave the same account.
“All of them reiterated that there were never any ICE agents in front of the van,” Balderas-Ibarra said. “They came in and started shooting from the sides.”
David Bier, director of immigration studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, said in a Friday social media post that the Post's reporting seems to show "ICE appears to have lied yet again about killing someone."
"Unbelievable," he added, "but actually totally believable given that they lie about events fully captured on video."
In a separate post, Bier examined a video of the shooting scene and noted that there appeared to be no damage to the front of Salgado Araujo's van, even as ICE claimed Salgado Araujo had tried to use it as a weapon against them.
Video appears to show no damage to the vehicle of the man ICE killed in Houston, who had lived in America peacefully for 35 years, despite ICE's claim that he "rammed" an ICE vehicle and "tried to run over" an agent. These people are not credible. https://t.co/3d3cBJBMUg pic.twitter.com/N7GqoW7ycq
— David J. Bier (@David_J_Bier) July 9, 2026
"These people are not credible," Bier remarked.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, pointed out that all three witnesses to the shooting were telling the same stories even though they were being detained separately, which he said bolsters their credibility.
"When you add the videos showing a lack of evidence of damage to the front despite ICE's ramming claim," Aaron Reichlin-Melnick added, "ICE's story is falling apart."
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