By LINDSAY WHITEHURST, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court said Wednesday it will consider South Carolina’s move to cut off Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood, the latest abortion-related case since the justices overturned Roe v. Wade.
The court agreed to take up the state’s appeal of a lower-court ruling focused on whether Medicaid patients can sue over their right to choose their own qualified provider. The case will be argued in the spring.
South Carolina moved in 2018 to cut off funding to Planned Parenthood. The organization uses Medicaid funding for family planning health services rather than abortions, but Gov. Henry McMaster said any public money sent there “results in the subsidy of abortion.”
Medicaid does not pay for abortion except in cases when a pregnant woman’s life is at risk or the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest. Planned Parenthood has previously said it gets less than $100,000 in South Carolina, one of many conservative-leaning states that sought to halt or reduce public funding for the nation’s largest U.S. abortion provider.
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The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the move after a challenge from the organization and a patient. It found that federal law lets Medicaid patients choose their providers, and sue if necessary.
Planned Parenthood’s medical services include birth control, cancer screenings and STD testing as well as abortions. Its two clinics in South Carolina serve hundreds of patients a year covered by Medicaid, a joint federal and state program that covers health services for low-income people.
South Carolina now bans abortion around six weeks of pregnancy, or when cardiac activity is detected, with limited exceptions. Most Republican-controlled states have move to restrict it since the high court overturned constitutional protections for abortion in 2022.
“South Carolina is free to use its limited funding to subsidize life-affirming care,” said John Bursch, an attorney with the group Alliance Defending Freedom who is representing the state. Other appeals courts have differed from the 4th Circuit, making it more important for the Supreme Court to take up the issue, he said.
Planned Parenthood had urged the court not to take up the case, saying in court papers that its affiliates “provide essential medical care to low-income individuals” and the law clearly gives patients the right to sue if cut off from accessing it.
The case is “politics at its worst,” Jenny Black, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, said in a statement. Black’s organization operates the South Carolina clinics.
“Everyone should be able to access quality, affordable health care from a provider they trust,” she said.