Trump administration imposes gag rule on family planning clinics, targeting Planned Parenthood

The Trump administration has slapped a gag rule on family planning clinics nationwide. Clinics that provide referrals for abortion will no longer be eligible for federal Title X funding. This represents a dramatic shift from the longstanding policy of prohibiting Title X funding for clinics that themselves provide abortions, but allowing it for those that provide referrals—and it’s a direct strike at Planned Parenthood.

There are four million mostly low-income women in the Title X program, and 41 percent of them are served by Planned Parenthood, which gets about $60 million in federal funding for the care it provides under that program. In addition to prohibiting abortion referrals at federally funded family planning clinics, the new rule requires “clear physical and financial separation” between government-funded services and the possibility of a referral.

Rep. Elijah E. Cummings and Sens. Patty Murray, Kamala Harris, and Maggie Hassan wrote a letter to Trump’s Health and Human Services department on Feb. 15, objecting to shortcuts the department had taken in moving the rule toward fruition and pointing out that “numerous major medical associations, 15 governors, 200 members of Congress, more than 20 state and local health departments, and more than 500,000 members of the public submitted comments opposing the rule on constitutional, legal, ethical, and policy grounds.” The 15 governors objecting to the gag rule are considering legal action to block it in their states.