Schools that give students information about abortion would lose federal funding under a provision House Republicans have tacked on to their pending education bill.
Public schools already don’t provide abortions, but the measure sponsored by Rep. Randy Neugebauer would require school health centers to both certify that — and promise they won’t provide students withabortion-related materials or referrals or directions to abortion services. If they don’t, they’d lose federal education funding.
“Our public schools should be a place for education, not an avenue for hardworking tax dollars to flow to political groups and abortion advocates,” Neugebauer, a Texas Republican, said in a statement.
The measure was added Wednesday to an education bill the House had planned to pass on Friday which would have updated the No Child Left Behind law. Republican leaders abruptly tabled the bill amid concerns by conservatives that it didn’t give states and localities enough control. They haven’t said when they’ll bring it up again. Even if the bill eventually passes, President Obama has threatened to veto it.
Planned Parenthood, which widely distributes educational materials in public schools and is the country’s largest abortion provider, opposes the measure, saying it would unfairly limit school health counselors.
“This amendment is a cowardly attack on young people’s access to thefull range of information about their reproductive health care,” Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards said in a statement. “Thisprovision ties the hands of health care professionals in schools, andwould deny teens access to important and basic information about theirhealth care options.”
