By Donald A. Collins | 27 August 2019
Church and State
Why cancel what Republican Nixon started in early 1970s?
The Health 202: Planned Parenthood's exit from family planning program checks off a box for Trump https://t.co/4zMwifucrn
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) August 20, 2019
Planned Parenthood is voluntarily exiting the federal family planning program under new restrictions from the Trump administration.
And its decision helps the president cement his popularity with abortion opponents ahead of 2020.
Yesterday, the women’s health and abortion provider said it’s leaving Title X, a program that gives around 90 grantees about $260 million every year for providing about 4 million low-income women with contraception along with screenings for sexually transmitted diseases and breast and cervical cancer. It’s a major shake-up, considering Planned Parenthood clinics are the single-largest provider of Title X services.
The Title X funds already couldn’t be used for abortions. But a new Department of Health and Human Services rule goes further by banning participating clinics from referring for abortions and requiring financial separation from facilities that provide abortions. Planned Parenthood officials, who are fighting the rule in court, said they’d rather leave the program entirely than comply with the new requirements.
“We will not be bullied into withholding abortion information from our patients,” said Planned Parenthood acting president Alexis McGill Johnson. “Our patients deserve to make their own health care decisions, not to be forced to have Donald Trump or Mike Pence make those decisions for them.”
The decision means President Trump can claim he “defunded Planned Parenthood,” one of four promises he made to antiabortion groups back in 2016 to win their support.
For the first time in nearly 50 years, Planned Parenthood is being forced out of the Title X program, meaning people across the country who are already struggling to make ends meet might not be able to access the care they need.
Absolutely devastating. #IStandWithPP #ProtectX https://t.co/UHjIKvhKq5
— Planned Parenthood Action (@PPact) August 19, 2019
Abortion foes have long begrudged Planned Parenthood the federal funds it collects, arguing there should be no co-mingling of taxpayer dollars and organizations that provide abortions. Adopting that stance helped Trump gain more confidence from the antiabortion community, which distrusted him immensely during the Republican primary.
Now, these groups view the president as a close ally. They were firing on all cylinders yesterday against Planned Parenthood’s contention that it was forced from the Title X program.
…
— Here are the other three promises the president made to antiabortion advocates in 2016:
- Nominate antiabortion justices to the Supreme Court.
- Sign a federal ban on abortions performed halfway through pregnancy.
- Make permanent lon-standing Hyde Amendment restrictions on the use of federal funds for abortions.
The president could argue he has also accomplished the first of those promises, with the confirmations of Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, two men that have shown some preference in the past for antiabortion arguments.
The other two promises — banning abortions midway through pregnancy and making Hyde permanent — are a lot harder for Trump to do, because both would require consent from a divided Congress.
But, politically speaking, that might not matter for Trump. He has already convinced conservatives who want strict limits on abortion that he’s on their side, regardless of calling himself “very pro-choice” on the issue in the past.
Why? He is the captive of the anti birth control crowd but also perhaps there is a more subtle reason!
Could it be partly because Trump hates uppity young black women and he is working hard to tell Americans that they are the face of the Democratic Party when nothing could be farther from the truth!
This lie is like blaming gun violence in the US on mental illness which is patently untrue according to a myriad of expert opinions!
His real fear is a possible recession now or before Election Day next year which is the only reason anyone except his hard core 40 percent would ever vote for him!
And with a good US economy it only takes a few votes more to plunge the US and the world into a second term and more of his strange intolerant behavior that our plundered planet can not afford to wait to fix!
All the NRA had to do was call Trump for him to abandon background checks for gun buyers.
Any doubts?
Former US Navy officer, banker and venture capitalist, Donald A. Collins, a free lance writer living in Washington, DC., has spent over 40 years working for women’s reproductive health as a board member and/or officer of numerous family planning organizations including Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Guttmacher Institute, Family Health International and Ipas. Yale under graduate, NYU MBA. He is the author of From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013.
From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013
By Donald A. Collins
Publisher: Church and State Press (July 30, 2014)
ASIN: B00MA40TVE
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