On a private call hosted by the White House Faith Office on Thursday, July 30, 2026, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump's nominee for attorney general, told the religious group Intercessors for America that efforts to restrict abortion were “taking longer than we want,” but that the Justice Department was “working hand-in-hand” with federal health agencies, the White House and Trump's team “to get permanent solutions so the Dobbs decision becomes permanent in every single state.” The group posted audio of the call on YouTube; Politico first reported it on August 3, and the recording was later removed.
Blanche's phrasing can be read as a promise of a nationwide ban, but Dobbs left abortion policy to the states, and what Blanche actually described is narrower and more concrete: action against mail-order abortion pills, aimed at stopping blue-state “shield law” providers from mailing medication into states that ban abortion. “If states have said, 'We are going to protect the unborn and we're going to protect every life from the moment of conception,' we're putting practices and policies in place so that other states and other organizations can't attack that,” he said. “They can't do things like they're doing with mailing in mail-order drugs.” He added, “We don't have complete victory yet, but we will have victory, and victory will be soon, and ... it will be permanent.” He did not say whether he would act through FDA drug-safety rules or the 1873 Comstock Act.
The Justice Department told The Hill the remarks “have been mischaracterized and need to be understood in their full context, which was with respect to mail order abortion drugs, not a broader expansion of federal control over states.” Politico reported that the comments went beyond what Blanche told the Senate Judiciary Committee at his July 15 confirmation hearing, and conflict with Trump's 2024 campaign vow not to use the Comstock Act against abortion pills, when he said “the federal government should have nothing to do with this issue.” Restricting interstate shipment of the pills would make existing state bans harder to get around. The Judiciary Committee advanced his nomination on August 4.
Correction (October 2, 2026): this entry said the call took place the week of August 4 and was dated August 4. Politico and Stateline report it took place on Thursday, July 30, 2026, and was reported on August 3; the date has been corrected. The title quoted Blanche as saying the DOJ would make “the Dobbs decision permanent”; his words were that the Dobbs decision “becomes permanent in every single state,” and the title now quotes them exactly. The “victory” quote joined two separately reported sentences without marking the omission and has been corrected to Politico's transcription. A line saying reproductive-rights groups treated the comments as significant, which no loaded source supported, has been replaced with Politico's reporting on how the remarks compare with Blanche's testimony and Trump's campaign pledge.