WCW VICTORY: DOD Bans Human Fetal Tissue Experiments on Animals

by White Coat Waste Staff · in Blog
  • Following a White Coat Waste investigation and campaign, the Defense Department has issued a new policy banning taxpayer funding for human fetal tissue research, including experiments on animals implanted with parts from aborted human fetuses. 
  • Last year, WCW exposed how the DOD was still funding multimillion-dollar, Biden-era grants that paid for disturbing experiments in which fingers, scalps, and other parts of aborted human fetuses are implanted into lab animals. 
  • In June, in response to WCW’s investigation, Congress voted to defund the DOD’s fetal tissue experiments on animals.
  • Last year, in immediate response to another WCW investigation, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) also announced that it would not renew millions in grants that funded fetal tissue experiments on animals.
  • Since 2019, WCW has uncovered taxpayer-funded experiments that have implanted scalps, fingers, skin, organs, and other body parts from aborted human fetuses into lab animals. 

UPDATE (11/9/26): Following WCW’s investigation and advocacy, the Defense Department has issued a new policy banning taxpayer funding for human fetal tissue research, including experiments on animals implanted with parts from aborted human fetuses. WCW’s campaign to end the Pentagon’s fetal tissue tests on animals garnered support and action from lawmakers, including Senators Joni Ernst and Rand Paul and the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus.

UPDATE (6/24/26): Following WCW’s investigation and advocacy, the House Appropriations Committee voted to cut funding for human fetal tissue experiments on animals in the Pentagon’s 2027 spending bill.

UPDATE (10/8/25): Hours after WCW’s new investigation broke, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed to journalist Laura Loomer that the agency is now investigating the grants we exposed:

ORIGINAL POST (10/8/25)

Since 2019, White Coat Waste has led a campaign that has united coalition partners and Congress to expose and end taxpayer funding for grotesque experiments in which parts of aborted human fetuses are implanted into lab animals.

Earlier this year, WCW even delivered explosive testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability on this subject.

WCW exposed a taxpayer-funded experiment that implanted human fetal intestines onto the intestines of live mice.

Earlier this month, less than a day after a new WCW investigation exposed active Biden-era NIH funding for human fetal tissue experiments on animals, the agency responded and confirmed, “The referenced grants, initiated under the Biden administration, will not be renewed.” All but one of the NIH’s 17 human fetal tissue grants were funding experiments on animals.

Now, we’ve uncovered how millions in Biden-era Department of Defense grants have also been wasted on horrific human fetal tissue experiments with monkeys and mice—and that some of that funding is still active.

Several of these DOD-funded human fetal tissue experiments created so-called “BLT mice”: animals implanted with pieces of bone marrow, thymus, and liver from aborted human fetuses.

Recent and active DOD grants to the University of Texas, Wistar Institute, University of California-Los Angeles, Rutgers University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison were wasted on fetal tissue experiments on animals.

The DOD budgets for some of these experiments are scheduled to run until August 2026, and could be renewed and re-funded if Congress and the Pentagon don’t take action.

WCW exposed how DOD-funded experimenters implanted fingers from 18-week-old human fetuses into the backs of 5-day-old mice. Four weeks after implantation, the taxpayer-funded lab broke the fingers and left them, fractured, on the baby mice for another two weeks.

Is this how you want your money spent?

A taxpayer-funded lab harvested scalps from aborted human fetuses and transplanted them onto mice and rats.

Defunding these disturbing animal experiments is one of WCW’s top priorities for the Trump Administration—it should be low-hanging fruit since they’ve done it before.

The solution is simple: