Supreme Court rules against Planned Parenthood in Medicaid funding dispute

The Supreme Court has ruled South Carolina  has the power to block Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood clinics, in a technical interpretation over healthcare choices that has emerged as a larger political fight over abortion access.

The case, Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, centers on whether Medicaid beneficiaries, particularly low-income patients, are granted the right to choose their healthcare provider under the Medicaid Act's "any qualified provider" provision and can sue to enforce that right. 

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster had been pushing to block public health dollars from going to Planned Parenthood, but a resident and patient at Planned Parenthood South Atlantic argued that doing so violated her rights under the Medicaid Act. 

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Federal law already prohibits Medicaid money from going to pay for abortions, with very limited exceptions, and South Carolina now bans almost all abortions around six weeks after conception.

In South Carolina, Medicaid patients often seek out Planned Parenthood because it accepts publicly funded insurance. 

There are just two Planned Parenthood clinics in South Carolina, but every year they take hundreds of low-income patients for reproductive healthcare, including contraception, cancer screenings and pregnancy testing, according to the Associated Press.

Planned Parenthood South Atlantic has argued that the case is not about abortion, but about access to general healthcare. 

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The case stretches back to 2018, before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, when McMaster signed an executive order directing the South Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to remove abortion clinics, including Planned Parenthood South Atlantic (PPSAT), from the state's Medicaid provider list. He did so to fulfill a campaign promise to defund Planned Parenthood and prevent tax dollars from paying for abortions. 

The action essentially barred low-income patients from receiving other services from PPSAT in Columbia and Charleston, including birth control, cancer screenings, and testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections (STIs). 

The conservative group Alliance Defending Freedom has argued that a win for South Carolina would still mean Medicaid patients could go to one of 200 other publicly funded healthcare clinics in the state. 

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Planned Parenthood, ruling that Medicaid patients can sue over their legal right to choose their own qualified provider.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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