This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
The U.S. Supreme Court is lining up to decide whether abortion profiteers can demand that they be allowed to participate in tax-funded programs like Medicaid – even after state officials determine they are not qualified.
It is the ADF that said it has submitted its opening brief to the high court in the Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic case in which lower courts said that officials in South Carolina are not allowed to direct Medicaid funding, that money intended to help low-income individuals get needed medical help – away from abortion industry representatives like Planned Parenthood.
"Taxpayer dollars should never be used to fund facilities that make a profit off abortion," said John Bursch, a lawyer for ADF.
"State officials should be free to determine that Planned Parenthood and other entities that peddle abortion are not qualified to receive taxpayer funding through Medicaid. Congress did not create a right for Medicaid recipients to drag states into federal court to challenge those decisions. Nor did Congress intend for federal courts to second guess states' decisions about which providers are qualified to receive Medicaid funding."
The state of South Carolina had determined that Planned Parenthood's abortion business components were not qualified to get tax money under the state's Medicaid, but a federal district court and then the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed.
ADF said the case could decide whether states like South Carolina are allowed to direct the aid program's money.
"The Medicaid Act is not a civil-rights statute. It is a program that anticipates cooperative federalism—'federal and state actors working together … to carry out the statute's aims.' Unsurprisingly, the Act focuses on that relationship between the states and the federal government—not the creation of individual healthcare rights," the brief informs the justices.
"To hold otherwise would encroach upon the executive and legislative branches' prerogatives while increasing the cost to the states of providing medical care to their neediest citizens."
Medicaid was created in 1965 as a federal-state cooperative giving medical assistance to the needy. It provides that patients can obtain help from any "qualified" provider.
This fight developed when patient Julie Edwards, getting Medicaid benefits, obtained treatment at Planned Parenthood and wanted to continue going there.
However, the governor said through an executive order that the state Health Department could no longer consider Planned Parenthood "qualified."
Planned Parenthood sued to keep getting paid under Medicaid.
