Clinics serve Medicaid healthcare program patients
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States seek to deprive abortion service providers of public funds
By Andrew Chung
WASHINGTON, June 26 (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way on Thursday for South Carolina to strip Planned Parenthood of moneying under the Medicaid insurance program in a judgment that strengthens efforts by Republican-led states to deprive the reproductive healthcare and abortion company of public cash.
The 6-3 ruling overturned a lower court's choice barring Republican-governed South Carolina from ending local affiliate Planned Parenthood South Atlantic's participation in the state's Medicaid program because the organization offers abortions.
The court's three liberal justices dissented from the choice.
The case fixated whether receivers of Medicaid, a joint federal and state medical insurance program for low-income individuals, might sue to impose a requirement under U.S. law that they may obtain medical support from any certified and willing supplier.
Since the Supreme Court in 2022 reversed its landmark Roe v. Wade ruling that had actually legalized abortion nationwide, a number of Republican-led states have implemented near-total bans or, like South Carolina, prohibitions after six weeks of pregnancy.
Planned Parenthood South Atlantic operates centers in the cities of Charleston and Columbia, where it serves hundreds of Medicaid patients each year, offering physical assessments, screenings for cancer and diabetes, pregnancy screening, contraception and other services.
The Planned Parenthood affiliate and Medicaid client Julie Edwards took legal action against in 2018 after Republican Governor Henry McMaster ordered South Carolina officials to end the organization's involvement in the state Medicaid program by considering any abortion company unqualified to supply household preparation services.
The plaintiffs sued South Carolina under an 1871 U.S. law that assists individuals challenge illegal acts by state officials. They stated the Medicaid law protects what they called a "deeply individual right" to choose one's physician.
The South Carolina Department of and Human Services, represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom conservative legal group and backed by President Donald Trump's administration, stated the challenged Medicaid arrangement in this case does not meet the "high bar for recognizing personal rights."
A federal judge ruled in Planned Parenthood's favor, discovering that Medicaid recipients may sue under the 1871 law and that the state's move to defund the company breached the right of Edwards to freely choose a qualified medical provider.
In 2024, the Richmond, Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals likewise agreed the plaintiffs.
The Supreme Court heard arguments in the case on April 2.
The conflict has reached the Supreme Court three times. The court in 2020 declined South Carolina's appeal at an earlier phase of the case. In 2023, it ordered a lower court to reconsider South Carolina's arguments due to a ruling the justices had the rights of retirement home citizens that discussed that laws like Medicaid must unambiguously provide people the right to sue.
(Reporting by Andrew Chung; Editing by Will Dunham)
