SCOTUS Denies Oklahoma's Request To Restore Funds In Abortion Referral Fight
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court refused Sept. 3 to restore a $4.5 million family planning grant to Oklahoma while the state’s challenge to the termination of the grant works its way through the lower courts.
At issue is a lawsuit that stems from funding Oklahoma routinely received before the passage of its abortion ban in 2022, which followed the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
To receive the funding under Title X of the Public Health Services Act of 1970, states are required to offer expectant mothers counseling for prenatal care, adoption and abortion, as well as referrals for abortion and adoption if requested.
Oklahoma’s abortion ban also makes it illegal to advise mothers to obtain abortions, and the new ban caused the federal government to cut the state’s family planning grant. Oklahoma sued in federal court to restore the grant for the 2024-2025 fiscal year, lost in the lower court, and Aug. 5 asked the High Court to issue an injunction restoring the funding while the case works its way through the courts.
The High Court refused to do so in an unsigned order with no explanation, with justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch indicating they would have granted the injunction.
Hannah Daniel, director of public policy for the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), said the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) erred in cutting the grant.
“Federal law clearly protects health care providers from being forced to provide referrals for abortion, and yet, the Biden administration continues to use all levers of power to promote its pro-abortion agenda,” Daniel said. “Yesterday’s decision from the Supreme Court to temporarily maintain this unjust status quo is disappointing. The ERLC will continue to closely monitor this and related litigation as it moves forward and will continue to advocate for robust life and conscience protections to be upheld and strengthened in federal law.”
HHS offered Oklahoma the option of providing expectant mothers with a telephone number of a national call-in hotline instead of in-person counseling services, but Oklahoma refused, leading to the termination of the grant, according to an explanation of the case at SCOTUSblog.org.
In its lawsuit, Oklahoma referenced the case of Tennessee v. Becerra in the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals regarding the stripping of millions of dollars in federal funding because the state also objected to providing abortion referrals. A decision is expected this month in that case, attorneys for Oklahoma said.
In its defense, Oklahoma said HHS violated the Constitution’s Spending Clause by imposing a funding condition – abortion referrals – that “this Court’s precedent … holds is not unambiguously required by Title X,” and violated the Weldon Amendment, “which expressly protects health care organizations who decline to refer for abortions under Title X.”
Oklahoma presented the county health department that receives the Title X funds as “part of the frontline of health care in Oklahoma,” and said “depriving those communities of Title X services would be devastating.”
This article was originally published at Baptist Press.
Diana Chandler is Baptist Press’ senior writer.