Posted on 10/27/2012 2:48:01 PM PDT by smoothsailing
October 26, 2012
Steven Ertelt
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to grant an additional hearing to Planned Parenthood regarding Texas’ legislation to end taxpayer funding of abortion companies, including Planned Parenthood.
The decision effectively ends the legal controversy surrounding the law and affirms Texas’ right to stop taxpayer dollars from flowing to abortion providers.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry applauded the decision, saying, “Today’s ruling affirms yet again that in Texas the Women’s Health Program has no obligation to fund Planned Parenthood and other organizations that perform or promote abortion. In Texas we choose life, and we will immediately begin defunding all abortion affiliates to honor and uphold that choice.”
This morning the Susan B. Anthony List praised the decision.
“States like Texas have the right to stop taxpayer funding of abortion providers. The Fifth Circuit court’s decision validates this and we applaud Texas for getting taxpayers out of the abortion business,” said SBA List President Marjorie Dannenfelser. “Abortion-centered organizations like Planned Parenthood neither need nor deserve taxpayer dollars.
Dannenfelser told LifeNews: “Governor Perry, the pro-life Texas state legislature, as well as our friends at Texas Right to Life deserve much praise. Even after the Obama Administration carried out its threat and cut funding for Texas’ Women’s Health Program because the state defunded abortion providers, Texas refused to yield. Governor Perry vowed to keep the Women’s Health Program, which serves vulnerable women, fully funded using state dollars. Texas has shown the rest of America what it means to be both pro-woman and pro-life.”
Last year the Texas state legislature defunded abortion providers including Planned Parenthood of state-controlled family planning funding. In December 2011, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) sent a letter to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission rejecting Texas’ law by turning down the state’s request to run their own family planning program. In March 2012, HHS officially stopped $30 million in federal funding for Texas’ Women’s Health Program because they excluded Planned Parenthood. Governor Perry pledged to fully fund the program using state dollars.
In August 2012, the Fifth Circuit court overturned the April 2012 ruling of a Texas judge who granted a preliminary injunction to Planned Parenthood affiliates while they sued the state of Texas over the law. Previously, Texas Governor Rick Perry pointed out that Planned Parenthood clinics represent less than two percent of the more than 2,500 enrolled providers.
Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit against Texas contending that the new law prohibiting it from participating in the Women’s Health Program is unconstitutional discrimination. The lawsuit asked the court for an injunction to stop enforcement of the rules preventing Planned Parenthood from getting taxpayer funding via the program , saying the rules violate their rights by putting an “unconstitutional condition on their participation” in the Women’s Health Program.
However, state officials quickly appealed the ruling — with Attorney General Greg Abbott filing an emergency motion for stay in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge Jerry E. Smith granted the stay “pending further order of this court” and requested a response from the abortion business by the close of business today.
In response, President Obama withdrew all federal support for the program, and Planned Parenthood sued the state of Texas. Judge Lee Yeakel blocked the law from going into effect, yet Yeakel’s ruling was appealed by Attorney General Greg Abbott, and the Fifth Circuit Court removed the block.
In addition to these approximately 4,000 agencies, Governor Perry’s office has identified another 2,500 eligible providers with 4,600 locations across the state. Planned Parenthood runs 69 facilities.
Before the lawsuit, the Obama Administration cut off the Women’s Health Care Program (WHP) for over 100,000 Texas women at over 2,400 providers for the sake of Planned Parenthood, which provides only limited health service at 44 facilities in Texas. In response, Governor Rick Perry and state lawmakers found their own funding for it.
Good, I was wrong about Perry. Keep up the good work Perry. Now they’ve defunded Planned Parenthood.
Texas is looking like a great place to live.. They also threatened to arrest U.N. ‘election monitors’ if they dare enter the State. Simply AWESOME.
Indeed!
In fairness, he told them they would have to abide by our election laws governing poll watchers, or he would arrest them.
As much as some of us might LIKE for him to have told the varmints 'keep OUT!'...he didn't :-)
Thank you SO much for this. I was well and truly needing some good news. Planned Parenthood is like a vampire with its dental daggars in your throat. Finally found a court (and a state) that would knock their teeth out.
Since PP funding is not written into the Constitution, only a law could have forced the government to pay them, so a law can be rescinded. What’s the problem with that? If the fed wants to fund PP, let them (until real Repubs take power and vote it out!). How does the law force states to fund them?
Someone has finally put a statewide stop to this horror. Congratulations Texas!
And follow up on keeping those UN nazis at bay.
I was happy to read this too!
I don’t care what anyone says, I like Rick Perry. :)
This is the opposite result from the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling striking down an identical law in Indiana. This matter is headed for the Supreme Court.
You beat me to it. Texas can defund PP, but Indiana can’t? I agree, headed to the SC. God help us there with people like the traitorous Judge Roberts on the court.
The way I read it, Texas has won, there will be no appeal. What Indiana does is seperate.
Confusion here!
If the state cuts off state money to fund abortion clinics, how can the federal government insist that the state spend state money on an activity it doesn’t want to pay for?
planned abortionhood should receive absolutely no money from any state or federal agency, period.
they are placing millions of dollars of ads to fight Romney and Republicans in this election. they are totally partisan.
why any court should even have to “rule” on something so transparent is ridiculous.
The Constitution was written for the common people, not for “constitutional scholars” which of course barry obama is supposed to claim.
I really think that if a person takes an oath to the Constitution he/she should be accountable for it. Ignorance is no excuse.
politicians are supposed to take an oath also. that eliminates socialists, communists and fascists and islamist fundamentalists.
voting is a privilege and not a right. if you have no skin in the game, you have no right to vote. a Constitutional test would be appropriate.
You cannot take an oath to the Constitution if you have not read it and do not understand it.
I want more than just an ID card to prove that you have the privilege to vote. that’s the way the Founding Fathers set it up, and they fought for their freedom and they were statesman.
No one has a right to vote. It is a privilege that you pay for because you contribute.
blessings, bobo
Thank God for Governor Perry!
and thank God for the Justices that actually followed the Constitution!
I am moving to Texas.
Blessings, bobo
It can insist all it wants, and the Fifth Circuit can tell Obama to stuff it! LOL!
Certainly PP can petition the USSC for cert on the Texas case on the basis of a conflict between the circuits on this issue. Ultimately the supremes will have to decide the issue.
Not the right, no, but the prerogative. Governments do not have rights.
That being said, duh!
You could be right, I’m no expert on these matters.
“How does the law force states to fund them”
It doesn’t. People make and courts accept false arguments all the time.
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