This morning, a federal court temporarily upheld the Trump administration’s move to disallow abortion facilities from receiving funds from the Title X National Family Planning Program. This will strip Planned Parenthood of up to $60 million in federal funding per year as other lawsuits challenging the policy continue to make their way through the courts.
In a 3-0 decision, the 9th Circuit Court overturned a lower court decision and granted a motion for a stay, allowing the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to allocate Title X funds according to Trump’s agenda.
“Absent a stay, HHS will be forced to allow taxpayer dollars to be spent in a manner that it has concluded violates the law, as well as the Government’s important policy interest (recognized by Congress in § 1008) in ensuring that taxpayer dollars do not go to fund or subsidize abortions,” the court stated. “Because HHS and the public interest would be irreparably harmed absent a stay … we conclude that a stay of the district court’s preliminary injunction orders pending appeal is proper.”
The abortion lobby is incredibly upset about this. The president of Planned Parenthood, Dr. Leana Wen, responded on Twitter this morning, calling Trump’s move “unethical, illegal, and harmful to public health.” But public health is not being harmed at all. Title X funds for women’s healthcare are not being dropped or reduced by a single cent. Rather, they’re simply being reallocated to health clinics that don’t provide abortion.
Title X funds will still be spent on several other services, including cancer screenings, STI testing, and contraceptives. The only service Trump’s Title X policy restricts is abortion. Yet Planned Parenthood acts as if Trump is attacking women’s healthcare in its entirety.
Some blue states, such as California and Washington, have ridiculously threatened to decline Title X funds altogether simply because those funds cannot go to abortion facilities. In other words, these states would deny their female residents low-cost legitimate health services simply so they can make a political statement about abortion. The ruling Democrats in these states are “playing politics” with women’s healthcare.
Though Planned Parenthood calls Trump’s policy a “gag rule,” it is actually faith-based health clinics that have long been “gagged” from receiving Title X funds. According to Politico, this will be the first time Title X funds can be allocated to faith-based health centers that provide services similar to their secular counterparts. This is a great step in the right direction by the Trump administration. If the government is going to spend money helping low-income women, it should give that money to the organizations that will spend it most effectively, and such organizations surely include some religious ones.
Today’s court ruling could be reversed in the future, and any Democratic nominee would certainly reverse Trump’s Title X policy if they beat him in 2020. But for now, the pro-life movement has made significant headway in deflating the abortion industry and protecting life in America.
