A federal grant program aimed at reducing teen pregnancy rates has faced sudden changes this summer under the Trump administration — including the abrupt cancellation of 53 of the 66 current grants in late June.
Established by Congress in 2010, the bipartisan Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program funds about $101 million in grants annually to improve the sexual and reproductive health outcomes of youth by using evidence-based education programs. The program’s goal is to help teens make healthy decisions that, in turn, reduce risky sexual behaviors and decrease sexually transmitted infections and unintended teen pregnancy.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services told AccessMatters, a nonprofit public health organization in Philadelphia, that its TPP grant was canceled on June 26. The organization’s CEO and president, Ayana Bradshaw, said AccessMatters’ five-year grant had two years of funding remaining — amounting to a total loss of $2.4 million.
The nonprofit used the funds to work with nine traditional public and charter schools in Philadelphia reaching over 2,200 youth, Bradshaw said. AccessMatters planned to expand its program to more schools in the city before the grant cancellation notice, she said.
During the school partnerships, AccessMatters collaborated with Education Plus Health to facilitate lessons in high schools about medically accurate information regarding HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. The curriculum, known as “Be Proud, Be Responsible,” also taught students about pregnancy prevention, hygiene, healthy relationship communication and consent.
AccessMatters’ grant cancellation notice from HHS said that some of the curricula used with grant funds was “normalizing adolescent sexual activity” and “not age appropriate” because it contained “overtly sexually explicit or pornographic content,” Bradshaw said.
AccessMatters has since filed a formal appeal for the Office of the Assistant Secretary forof Health to review.
HHS faces legal challenge
Meanwhile, a July lawsuit was filed against HHS by two local governments, Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, and the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States. The plaintiffs filed the case in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, asking it to vacate implementation of the policy changes to TPP and to administer the existing grants as required by federal law.
The complaint alleges that days before HHS canceled most of the existing TPP grants on June 26, the agency released two new Notices of Funding Opportunity, which said that TPP funds must:
- Include “abstinence-only ‘sexual risk avoidance’” education.
- Require awardees to “align” with agency priorities prohibiting “gender ideology” and diversity, equity and inclusion practices.
- Restrict discussion of teen sexual activity despite the program’s statutory mandate to reduce teen pregnancy using “medically accurate” and “age appropriate” interventions.
The plaintiffs claim that when HHS cut the TPP grants in the middle of their funding cycles, it did so because “awardees’ curricula failed to conform to the same agency priorities that had been introduced as program requirements in the new NOFOs three days prior.”
The TPP program has reached over 1.4 million youth since 2010, according to the lawsuit.
Because of these changes to TPP grants, the plaintiffs said they and other recipients had to suspend or begin dismantling their teen education programs while also “jeopardizing” their partnerships with schools, healthcare providers and community organizations.
“Those harms are ongoing and will only grow worse absent preliminary relief. Many participating schools organize programming around the academic calendar,” the complaint said. “In the end, the adolescents that the Program is designed to help will suffer as appropriated funds are redirected to programs that have not been proven to reduce teen pregnancy.”
HHS did not respond to a request for comment on the TPP grant cancellations in time for publication.
TPP cuts are not unusual under Trump
In a July 1 letter to U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a group of Senate Democrats expressed “outrage” over the TPP grant terminations and called for their reinstatement.
The senators said teen birth rates have declined over the past 35 years due to several factors — the use of more effective contraception, greater access to information about pregnancy prevention, and a decline in teen sexual activity — efforts the TPP program has supported for over 15 years.
The letter also said that the Trump administration has long targeted TPP, from proposing to cut the program in his fiscal year 2026 budget to attempting to cancel every TPP grant in 2017 during his first administration.
Because AccessMatters’ TPP grant termination went into effect immediately, Bradshaw said the nonprofit didn’t have time to ramp down its school partnerships. As schools prepare for the 2026-27 school year, she said she expects many of the partnering schools will feel the impact of the grant cuts when students return to class.
Philadelphia has the second highest STI rate among major U.S. cities, and the AccessMatters TPP grant worked toward addressing that, Bradshaw said.
In Pennsylvania, there isn’t a comprehensive statewide sex education policy, meaning each school and district likely approach the curriculum differently, Bradshaw said. Federal programs like TPP help supplement what some schools may not be directly providing, she added.
“Because we don’t have comprehensive sex ed in the state, we can’t take away programs like this when it’s being taught in different ways,” Bradshaw said.
