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Judge blocks “Whole Woman’s Health Funding Priority Act of Arizona”

Feb 14, 2013

By Dave Andrusko

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer

Picking up where he left off last October,  U.S. District Court Judge Neil Wake has permanently blocked an Arizona law that bars the state from contracting with or making a grant to any entity that performs an abortion or maintains an abortion facility. The Whole Woman’s Health Funding Priority Act of Arizona (HB 2800) was signed into law by Gov. Jan Brewer last May.

Brewer described the law as a measure that “closes loopholes in order to ensure that taxpayer dollars are not used to fund abortions, whether directly or indirectly.” The law provides that neither the state nor any political subdivision of the state “may . . . enter into a contract with or make a grant to” abortion providers for family-planning services. Further, “subject to any applicable requirements of federal law, regulations or guidelines,” the law establishes a priority system for entities that may receive family-planning funding.

Judge Wake would have none of that. His 11-page ruling makes permanent what he temporarily blocked while the issue was being litigated. (The state has already asked the 9th U.S. Court of Appeals to overturn  Wake’s October 19 preliminary ruling on the lawsuit filed by the Planned Parenthood affiliate and a physician.)

In a decision released last Friday Wake wrote that he had seen nothing that convinces him of the state’s position. “A state may not restrict a beneficiary’s right to select any qualified provider for reasons wholly unrelated to the provider’s ability to deliver Medicaid services,” Wake wrote.  “Every Medicaid beneficiary has the right to select any qualified health-care provider.”

The state’s position is that PPFA would be eligible if it stops performing abortions or creates a separate legal entity.

Mary Spaulding Balch, JD, NRLC’s director of State Legislation, told NRL News Today, “The state is not required to subsidize abortion, directly or indirectly, and is totally within its right when it passes laws to prevent taxpayer dollars from going to the abortion industry.”

She added, “The district court’s decision will ultimately be overturned, as it was in Texas. ”There is no right, constitutional or otherwise, to have taxpayer funds going to abortion providers.”

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Categories: Judicial