WASHINGTON, D.C. — As the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) considers new drinking water contaminants to monitor, Liberty Counsel Action (LCA) has recommended the agency add the chemical abortion drug mifepristone and its active metabolites to its monitoring list. 

Under the Safe Water Drinking Act, the EPA reviews and updates the list of unregulated drinking water contaminants that must be monitored every five years, known as the Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule (UCMR). When new contaminants are added to the list, it triggers an evaluation into the levels at which these contaminants are present in public water systems, and whether they carry a significant health risk and what regulations are needed. The EPA has opened a unique public comment period soliciting input for the rule until August 31, 2026.

LCA submitted a 65-page formal comment urging the EPA to add mifepristone and its active metabolites to UCMR 6 so public water systems can start collecting nationwide data. In addition to the written testimony, on August 11, 2026, Liberty Counsel Action Public Policy Analyst and Copywriter Abigail Forman gave oral testimony to EPA officials regarding the risks posed by mifepristone in the public water system. 

In the comment, LCA points to the widespread and increasing use of chemical abortion drugs at home, which accounts for approximately 700,000 chemical abortions annually. These at-home abortions are polluting U.S. water systems and drinking water through human excretion, aborted human fetal remains, and related medical waste expelled and flushed into America’s wastewater systems. These expulsions contain mifepristone’s active metabolites which the wastewater systems are not designed to filter out. 

Mifepristone deserves heightened scrutiny because no other FDA approved drug has been designed and approved to be lethal in nature by starving a baby in the womb. The drug’s biologically active metabolites also have “long half-lives” and retain the “considerable” ability of the parent drug to block the vital fertility hormone progesterone, which makes the metabolites operate as “endocrine disruptors,” wrote LCA. The comment noted that numerous scientific studies show even “trace amounts” of endocrine-disrupting substances can have adverse effects on health and fertility. Considering the inability of wastewater plants to completely filter out active metabolites from these abortions, as well as 23,000-75,000 annual sanitary system overflows and up to 425 billion gallons of sewer discharge into the environment, it is probable that the human remains and medical waste from at-home chemical abortions are contaminating American water bodies.  

“Corroborating these facts, a peer-reviewed study published July 20, 2026, ‘Anti-Progesterone in Environmental Water,’ reports finding ‘significant levels of mifepristone’ in eight out of nine water samplings from three U.S. cities, including two municipal tap water samples (in Carbondale, Illinois and Austin, Texas),” reads the comment. 

As these chemicals have also been detected in wastewater internationally, this peer-reviewed study has validated what LCA has long proposed that at-home abortions are likely contaminating U.S public water systems, wrote LCA. 

Since UCMR data helps serve science-based decision-making for environmental regulations, mifepristone and its active metabolites should be included on the final UCMR 6 for monitoring and evaluation, concluded LCA. 

Liberty Counsel Action President John Stemberger said, “The chemical abortion drug mifepristone is being used in most abortions annually where it is being flushed into U.S. wastewater systems. Yet, in its 26 years on the market, there has been no federal environmental monitoring or evaluation of mifepristone’s environmental effects. Mifepristone’s primary action is blocking the vital fertility hormone progesterone. Given the nation’s infertility crisis and the growing concern of the health risks of endocrine disruptors in our water, the drug’s active metabolites warrant immediate monitoring efforts. By naming mifepristone to the Sixth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule, the Environmental Protection Agency can properly evaluate the drug’s environmental and public health implications. We encourage our supporters to also submit comments to the EPA.”

To send a public comment to the EPA regarding revisions to Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule 6, click here. 

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