Last week, President Trump gathered RFK Jr., Dr. Mehmet Oz, and a room full of pronatalists to push his fertility and maternal healthcare agenda — and hosts Heather and Lisa had a lot of feelings about it. Sure, they had a field day with Dr. Oz's declaration that one in three Americans are "underbabied" and RFK Jr.'s, er, passionate interest in teen sperm counts. (Yes, really.) But once the laughing died down, things got a lot more serious. In this episode, Heather and Lisa dig into the policy proposals that came out of that press conference — ones that could have genuinely dangerous consequences for maternal healthcare — and unpack the complicated, often misunderstood research behind declining birth rates in the U.S. and around the world.

Show Notes

The following sources were consulted in preparation for this discussion:

The Daily Show's segment on President Trump’s press conference on maternal healthcare: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWF4XLGBEAU

Full Maternal Healthcare Press Conference https://www.c-span.org/program/white-house-event/president-trump-hosts-maternal-health-care-event/678967

"Temporal Trends in Sperm Count," Levine et al., Human Reproductive Update, November 2022. https://academic.oup.com/humupd/article/29/2/157/6824414

“710,000 Fewer Babies Were Born Last Year in U.S. Compared With Two Decades Ago” by Brian Mann, NPR https://www.npr.org/2026/04/09/nx-s1-5779627/birthrate-united-states-babies-immigration

“A Dangerous Shift in Maternal Health Policy” by Stephanie Psaki, Dara Kass and Elizabeth Tobin-Tyler, Time https://time.com/article/2026/04/29/a-dangerous-shift-in-maternal-health-policy/

“No More Babies? Nobel Laureate’s Take On Fertility Decline” by Avivah Wittenberg-Cox, Forbes https://www.forbes.com/sites/avivahwittenbergcox/2025/06/16/no-more-babies-nobel-laureates-take-on-fertility-decline/

Babies and the Macroeconomy by Claudia Goldin https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w33311/w33311.pdf

Why So Few Births? Hoover Institution https://www.hoover.org/research/why-so-few-births

“Funding Cut for Landmark Study of Women's Health” by Rob Stein, NPR https://www.npr.org/2025/04/23/nx-s1-5372892/womens-health-initiative-research-funding-gets-cut

“What Happens to Health Research When 'Women' and 'Diversity' Are Banned Words?” by Shefali Luthra and Barbara Rodriguez, The 19th/PBS https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/what-happens-to-health-research-when-women-and-diversity-are-banned-words

Documentary: “Liberty Lost” https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/liberty-lost/id1815337795

Documentary: “Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever” 2025 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kf9e1o7rUeo

These organizations are working to increase women’s healthcare access:

Women’s Healthcare Access Matters https://whamnow.org/

The Guttmacher Institute https://www.guttmacher.org/

Center for Reproductive Rights https://reproductiverights.org/