Oklahoma seeks Supreme Court order that Biden administration stop blocking health grants amid abortion referral dispute
By Tierney Sneed, CNN
(CNN) — Oklahoma is asking the Supreme Court to stop the Biden administration from denying federal family planning funding to the state amid a dispute over abortion counseling.
As a condition of receiving $4.5 million in family planning grants under Title X, the US Department of Health and Human Services is requiring that Oklahoma’s programs provide the call-in number to a national hotline that provides information about family planning options, including abortion.
But Oklahoma argued in filings submitted Wednesday to Justice Neil Gorsuch – who oversees emergency matters arising from the state – that this requirement runs afoul a law that prohibits discrimination against health entities that refuse to refer for abortion, as well as a Supreme Court precedent on the use of Title X funding for abortion.
The state also pointed to the Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling ending national abortion protections that allowed for the state’s abortion ban to take effect.
“HHS’s regulation foists upon Oklahoma a requirement concerning an issue that has been recognized as specifically reserved to the people to address in Dobbs,” Oklahoma said, referring to the 2022 ruling. It said that the Biden administration has “deliberately sought to impose the executive branch’s policy preferences on the states, including Oklahoma, and upset the federal-state balance on this important issue.”
The Oklahoma State Department of Health distributes the federal funding to public health services and county health departments across the state.
“These county health departments are part of the frontline of healthcare in Oklahoma, and they provide comprehensive, connected care to numerous patients,” the filing said. “Depriving those communities of Title X services would be devastating.”
Previously in the case, the 10th US Circuit Court of Appeals declined to issue an order blocking the Biden administration from denying the grants. The 2-1 panel concluded that HHS had the authority to implement the requirement and that providing the national hotline number did not amount to an abortion referral under the relevant law.
Oklahoma has asked the Supreme Court to act by August 30, as the federal government has agreed to wait until that date before distributing to other entities the grants that would have gone to the state.
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