Friday, March 29, 2024

New Trump Admin Rules Abort Planned Parenthood’s Funding

This week, theDepartment of Health and Human Services announced that it would begin enactingrevised regulations of Title X, a federal grant programfor non-profit providers of family planning services. Changes to the programannounced in February prohibit organizations which provide abortions fromreceiving taxpayer money.  

Unsurprisingly, abortionproviders complained, often citing that federal taxpayer abortion funding isalready prohibited by the Hyde Amendment and that the rule is unfair to them.Yet, they conveniently ignore the economic reality that money is fungible. Forexample, funding any Planned Parenthood activities means that privately-sourcedmoney can then be re-allocated for abortions. Planned Parenthood operates more than half of the abortion clinics in the United States. Without a doubt, theseabortion services will be negatively effected by the funding cut, even if thefunding wasn’t being directly used for that purpose.

The changes to Title Xalso include a regulation prohibiting groups which receive funding fromreferring for abortions — a provision leftists are calling a “gag rule,” inline with their typical hysterics. A good example of one of those intemperatestatements was issued by the militantly pro-abortion group NARAL, who bemoanedthat the new rule creates  “a country where a culture of forced silence dominates over women’s health.” 

While such statementsmay give the impression that these regulations are an unprecedented attack onabortion, that is actually not the case. This so-called Title X “gag rule”isn’t even new: the Reagan administration enacted it in 1984. It wassubsequently repealed by the Clinton administration in 1993, drawingsignificant controversy after more than a decade of pro-life presidencies.Trump’s reinstatement of the rule is simply an organizational shift backtowards caution in medical ethics and grantmaking, and even removes oppressiveprovisions implemented by the Obama administration forcing providers to discuss abortion with pregnant mothers.

These new regulationsalso frame a really bad week for supporters of elective abortions. PlannedParenthood received heavy criticism for terminating Leana Wen’s presidency onTuesday after eight months, reportedly because of Wen’s emphasis onmedicalizing abortion rather than pursuing aggressive political action. Andafter this spring’s veritable wave of pro-life state legislation, the abortionlobby was also hit with an Arkansas law taking effect which bans abortionsafter 18 weeks.  

As usual, this win for medical ethics has been a loss for the abortion industry. It is also a boon to conservatives. In addition to forcing Planned Parenthood to defund itself rather than comply, it has also given pro-life clinics a chance to compete against them.  Previous rules had made it challenging for faith-based family-planning clinics to receive Title X funding, forcing them to choose between their beliefs and pro-abortion legal mandates. But with the abortion language modified, they will be now able to seek federal grants. As a consequence, they will be able to expand vital prenatal care and sexual health services, and offer a moral alternative to organizations such as Planned Parenthood.

Meanwhile, no doubt Planned Parenthood is simply grateful this week is finally over.

Photo credit: American Life League via Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0

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