A fierce battle over the future of reproductive rights is now underway in Washington as congressional Republicans made the first move last week to slash funding for Planned Parenthood.
In starting to roll back the Affordable Care Act, the GOP also is planning to target the country’s largest women’s health care provider. Planned Parenthood could lose millions in dollars of reimbursements from Medicaid and other funding as soon as this spring, if the repeal effort advances.
President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head the Health and Human Services department, Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., is likely to be an ally — his ACA replacement bill prevents federal funds from going to health care plans that cover abortions.
Planned Parenthood has responded by organizing a massive public outreach campaign aimed at convincing Congress that voters support the nonprofit group. Women’s rights groups have descended on the Capitol, and Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards is in the midst of a TV blitz. Two weeks ago, abortion rights advocates attempted to deliver more than 70,000 petitions to the office of House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.
Many of those activists worry that the Republican Congress — helped by Trump — will seize on blanket control of Washington to further restrict and ban some abortion procedures, or even seek to reverse Roe v. Wade, the 40-year-old Supreme Court decision that legalized the procedure.
“Right now we are trying to do everything possible to fight back against these attempts and talk to members of Congress,” Raegan McDonald-Mosley, Planned Parenthood chief medical officer, said in an interview. “We will continue to be around, but if we are unable to serve that million-plus people, our organization will certainly look different.”
Capitol Hill Republicans have given abortion rights supporters cause for alarm. They have long unsuccessfully targeted Planned Parenthood, arguing that no abortion provider should receive federal funding — next week, they intend to vote on a measure to ban such funding with exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother.
Although previous GOP efforts to defund the group ended in a veto by President Obama, Republicans are hopeful that Trump will support such language. Many Republicans were deeply disturbed by undercover video released last year that some viewed as showing Planned Parenthood officials talking about selling fetal tissue.
“We don’t want to effectively commit taxpayer money to an organization providing abortions,” Ryan said at a recent CNN town hall.
Democrats insist that federal law already prevents public money from paying for abortions and argue that Planned Parenthood provides broad health services — from birth control to screening for sexually transmitted diseases to preventive care like mammograms.
Democrats acknowledge that with no check from the president, congressional Republicans may succeed in using special budget procedures to slash funding for the group by as much as 50 percent.
“This has been an easy vote for a lot of Republicans to say they’re going to take a political vote. But this time it’s real bullets,” said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., the No. 3 Senate Democrat.
“They will have people in their home states, in their communities, who don’t get access,” Murray said in a recent interview. “They will see Planned Parenthood clinics cut down and the world will go very dark for a lot of people.”
Planned Parenthood estimates that half of the 2.5 million patients who visit its clinics each year are insured through Medicaid. Of those patients, about 10 percent are men, and 75 percent meet the federal definition of low or moderate income, McDonald-Mosley said.
Abortion-rights supporters worry attacks on Planned Parenthood could be the first volley in a broader strategy. Unlike the ACA, which Ryan and other leaders have said will remain while a replacement plan is phased in, a measure targeting Planned Parenthood is expected to take effect as soon as the repeal bill passes — potentially ending access to services within months for more than a million women.