Just weeks after the Obama administration warned states that their Medicaid funding would be jeopardized if they tried to defund Planned Parenthood, Kansas goes and does it—strips Planned Parenthood of the state's portion of Medicaid funding.
Kansas’ move comes after anti-abortion activists last summer released highly edited videos purporting to show that Planned Parenthood clinics illegally sold fetal tissue for profit. Earlier this year, the Kansas Board of Healing Arts said it was not taking any action against Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri after failing to find evidence of wrongdoing. Similar investigations in other states, including Missouri, have also cleared Planned Parenthood clinics. […]
“Governor Brownback’s own administration, including the Board of Healing Arts and the Kansas Department of Health and Environment vindicated Planned Parenthood of the egregious allegations made against it in 2015,” [president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri, Laura] McQuade said in her statement. “Brownback is using health care as a political football, and it’s Kansans who will pay the price if he’s not stopped. This is not over. Our doors are open today, they’ll be open tomorrow, and we’ll fight this with everything we’ve got.”
Kansas isn't first state to try this, and courts have acted by blocking the clearly and unequivocally illegal defunding in four states. This move is a testament to how deeply committed Kanas Gov. Sam Brownback is to grinding his state into dust. As if it wasn't in a deep enough crisis, now the state's going to take on a very expensive lawsuit. All so Brownback could punish poor women just a little bit more.