MAGA needs moms. In 2024, mom-led groups like Moms for Liberty and MAHA helped tip ballot boxes in favor of Trump and his favored candidates. As distrust grows in the latter group’s ranks, MAGA will need moms again in 2026 and 2028 — particularly white, suburban moms — both for its electoral ambitions and for its longer pronatalist aims of reversing falling fertility rates.
With moms on the mind, then, the White House launched a new website, Moms.gov, on Mother’s Day. Members of the administration then touted the site at a Monday press conference, where Dr. Mehmet Oz warned that “One in three Americans are ‘under-babied,’” and where Trump declared himself the “father of fertility.”
The word “abortion” never appears on the Moms.gov homepage, but the message is anti-abortion all the same.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. promoted Moms.gov as “one-stop shopping for IVF, for prenatal care, for postnatal care, for nutrition, for baby formula, and of course, for TrumpRx.” It would be more accurate, however, to say that the website is aimed at asserting Trump’s “pro mom” bona fides while preying on vulnerable women with thinly veiled propaganda of an anti-abortion, anti-vaccine, and anti-feminist bent.
Take, for example, Moms.gov’s first section, on pregnancy support. The website says, sympathetically, that “navigating pregnancy can feel overwhelming, but you don’t have to do it alone.” Moms.gov then offers a link to “Find Pregnancy Centers Near You,” promising that these centers “offer pregnancy tests, ultrasounds, STD/STI testing and treatment, parenting support, childbirth classes, medical referrals, and material goods like clothes and diapers—at no cost to you.”
What the website doesn’t disclose, however, is that the linked website, Option Line, is operated by the Christian anti-abortion organization Heartbeat International. It directs women away from clinics like Planned Parenthood and toward faith-based crisis pregnancy centers, where they will be bombarded with misinformation and love-bombed with support. The word “abortion” never appears on the Moms.gov homepage, but the message is anti-abortion all the same.
Similarly, contraception goes unmentioned but the site is still subtly anti-contraception in its aims. The section on preconception health, for example, promotes use of “Fertility Awareness-Based Methods,” which “can help you recognize signs of your fertile period and identify underlying health conditions, such as polycystic ovary syndrome and endometriosis.” What isn’t mentioned, however, is that these methods (also called “Natural Family Planning”) are promoted by Christian organizations, Project 2025 and social media influencers as an alternative to the kinds of hormonal contraception that some conservative lawmakers are currently trying to ban. Nor does Moms.gov tell readers that FABMs have a high rate of failure, as do associated fertility-tracker and period-tracker apps.
This emphasis on faith over science can also be seen in the website’s treatment of vaccines. Buried deep in the linked subpages, it’s possible to find resources recommending hepatitis B vaccines for babies. Even then, the source only suggests the vaccine for babies born to mothers who test positive for HBV, rather than to all newborns as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Much more prominent, however, is the site’s “Conscience Overview,” which emphasizes parents’ rights to follow their “religious beliefs and moral convictions” when making healthcare decisions, including decisions regarding childhood vaccines. In that sense, then, Moms.gov is consistent with other Kennedy efforts: designed to skirt accusations of being overtly anti-vaccine while still sowing the kind of doubt that has contributed to a rapid increase in measles cases in the U.S.
While Trump talked up in vitro fertilization during Monday’s event, IVF isn’t mentioned directly on the Moms.gov homepage. Instead, visitors looking to start a family are directed to “find the world’s lowest prices on prescription medications on TrumpRx.” This redirection, in turn, serves two Trumpian purposes. First, it avoids running afoul of conservative Catholic and evangelical groups that oppose reproductive technologies on religious grounds. And second, it pushes desperate consumers toward an online marketplace that does little to actually lower prescription drug costs, but crucially does have Trump’s name attached.
The only mention of working motherhood on the homepage links to a warning that “workplace exposures, conditions, and tasks can affect workers’ sexual and reproductive health.”
As a whole, in fact, Moms.gov carries a strong anti-feminist undercurrent. In March, the Trump-allied Heritage Foundation released a new document titled “Saving America by Saving the Family.” Heritage, which previously spearheaded Project 2025, blamed falling fertility rates not only on “the proliferation of birth control,” but also on “more prospects for women to receive higher education and work outside the home, the delayed financial independence of young adults, and the government’s role in old-age security.”
As with vaccines, Moms.gov sidesteps this kind of overtly hostile rhetoric. But the only mention of working motherhood on the homepage links to a warning that “workplace exposures, conditions, and tasks can affect workers’ sexual and reproductive health.” The section on breastfeeding makes no mention of the challenges that moms often face when trying to combine breastfeeding and paid employment, particularly without sufficient paid family leave. Instead, it simply stresses that “breastfeeding provides many health benefits for you and your baby,” and that it “saves lives, money, and time.”
The message here is subtle but clear: The “tradwife” life is the only safe choice for babies and moms.
Now, you might ask, given Trump’s declining popularity and penchant for disinformation, why would moms and would-be moms turn to Moms.gov? Unfortunately, the U.S. overwhelms women with responsibilities, including the responsibility for their own and their children’s health.
Take one mom I interviewed for my book “Holding It Together,” who, after an unexpected pregnancy, found herself caring for a newborn and a one-year-old without any support at home. “My son needed full and undivided attention and my fiancé was working,” she said. “It was very daunting and very stressful and sometimes it felt like I was drowning in it almost. It took me about a month after I delivered my daughter to really, like, bond to her the way that I was supposed to be.”
Even with that stress, she still had to make anxiety-inducing decisions about healthcare. “Basically anything that I don’t already know myself I will reach research until I’m blue in the face before I make a decision,” she said.
All that pressure makes it difficult for moms and would-be moms to stay informed politically and to sift through the flood of conflicting advice about pregnancy and motherhood. And so, when Moms.gov shows up at the top of Google search results, it’s easy for overwhelmed parents to click and hope they can trust an “official website of the United States government” as a “one-stop shop” for resources, information and advice. Unfortunately, the shop’s proprietors only have propaganda for sale.
Jessica Calarco
Dr. Jessica Calarco is a sociologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute and the author of "Holding it Together: How Women Became America’s Safety Net."