Planned Parenthood braces for serious financial jolt from Trump

(Image courtesy Pixabay)

A new rule adopted by the Trump administration that is expected to deprive the abortionists at industry leader Planned Parenthood hits Monday.

That's the rule that Title X funds cannot go to clinics that conduct abortions or refer them.

The pending change has been upheld by a numerous court decisions.

But now Jordan Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice says the first deadline has come for the abortion industry to prove it is complying in order to continue getting funds.

"HHS has announced the first date for Planned Parenthood and other Title X recipients to provide 'assurance' of compliance is Monday, August 19th," he explained.

"Because this is a major blow to abortion businesses like Planned Parenthood who have enjoyed using tax dollars through Title X to fund their abortion empire, HHS allowed an appropriate timeline for organizations to make necessary operational changes, and prove they are making significant steps toward complying and no longer utilizing Title X monies in a way that subsidizes their abortion business."

He explained that in the past, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Population Affairs (OPA), "has exercised enforcement discretion in appropriate circumstances and taken into consideration the time needed for policies to be amended or updated and approved by boards, and for training of personnel in its 4,000 sites on such new or revised policies."

"OPA is committed to work with grantees to assist them in coming into compliance with the requirements of the Final Rule. Given the current circumstances surrounding the implementation of the Final Rule, OPA does not intend to bring enforcement actions against Title X recipients that are making, and continue to make, good faith efforts to comply with the Final Rule."

He said the requirements are that fund recipients document how they plan to comply on Monday, provide evidence of compliance by Sept. 18 and document by March 4, 2020, "physical separation between Title X services and abortions."

Planned Parenthood has said it will forgo all $60 million in taxpayer funding it normally gets from Title X.

Sekulow called it "a huge victory for life and ensures that Title X funding will no longer be used to subsidize the abortion industry and will go entirely to those entities that only provide comprehensive family planning services."

The bad news for Planned Parenthood came when the HHS rule made clear that the services that qualify for Title X funding do "not include abortion as a method of family planning."

Sekulow said the new HHS rules simply implement Title X in the way that Congress originally intended.

"Yet, despite abortion being clearly prohibited, previous administrations did not implement Title X as Congress intended; and as a result, Planned Parenthood has gotten its hands on roughly $60 million dollars of Title X funding each year. In fact, Planned Parenthood has accounted for as much as 41 percent of the services funded by Title X."

Planned Parenthood had gone to court to maintain the flow of federal cash, but the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the challenge.

While the victory is monumental, Sekulow said there's still work to be done, with abortionists getting some $500 million in tax funding through other programs.

The no-abortions rule had been in place during the Reagan administration, and the Supreme Court approved it to settle legal action at that time.