Pro-Life Advocates Skeptical That Spending Bill Will Lead to Obamacare Abortion Transparency

Christian Post ^ | December 12, 2014 | Samuel Smith

[Morgana]

Protesters against President Obama's HHS mandate requiring religious institutions provide contraception and abortion related services through health insurance hold signs outside City Hall in Cincinnati, Ohio, March 23, 2012.

Although a federal funding bill the House passed on Thursday includes language urging the Department of Health and Human Services to ensure Obamacare's federal health exchange provides consumers with transparency on which plans include a separate elective abortion surcharge, pro-life advocates are skeptical that HHS will actually listen to Congress.

Pro-lifers in the House sought to include in the CRomnibus appropriations bill, which would keep the federal government funded through next September if it passes the Senate, two concrete amendments that would have forced greater abortion transparency on the exchanges and created a legal course of action for those individuals and institutions discriminated against because they do not cover abortions for their employees.

But to the ire of pro-life advocates, neither the No Taxpayer Funding For Abortion Act nor the Abortion Non-Discrimination Act were included in the base bill. Instead, pro-lifers had to settle for non-binding language, which is seen as just a slap on the wrist to HHS for not providing consumers with enough detail about which plans on the exchange cover elective abortions.

"The report language is simply telling HHS to clarify with the insurers which plans basically do and don't cover elective abortion," David Christensen, the vice president of government affairs for the social conservative and pro-life advocacy group Family Research Council, told The Christian Post in a Friday interview.

[Morgana]

Really all of obozocare should be ditched.