Oklahoma Sues Biden For Denying It Health Care Funds Because It Won’t Use Them to Pay for Abortions

Oklahoma has filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration for denying it federal health care funds because it refuses to use them to fund abortions.

As LifeNews reported previously, pro-life states’ efforts to expand essential health care to women and families are being thwarted by the very same people who accuse these states of failing to provide it. First, it was Texas, and the Oklahoma was denied funding to expand medical care to low-income women by Joe Biden’s administration.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rescinded a $4.5 million Title X grant to the Oklahoma State Department of Health to provide family planning services, such as birth control, counseling, STI testing and treatment, and other health services, to low-income individuals.

In May, HHS accused Oklahoma of being “out of compliance” with the family planning program and therefore ineligible for the grant money.

The reason: abortion.

Oklahoma protects unborn babies by banning elective abortions and taxpayer funding for abortions. But to receive the grant money, the Biden administration now requires states to promote abortions through abortion referrals.

Now, Oklahoma is fighting back.

The state said in the lawsuit that HHS “overreached by unlawfully suspending and terminating millions of dollars of Title X grant funding” to the state.

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That funding “has been terminated solely because Oklahoma will not commit to providing referrals for abortion,” the lawsuit claims.

Oklahoma’s lawsuit says the state has “administered the Title X family planning program in Oklahoma for more than 40 years,” using the grants to “disperse funds through 68 county health departments, who provide critical public health services to rural and urban Oklahoma communities.”

In May of this year, the lawsuit says, HHS pulled Title X funding from the state after having accused it of being “in violation of Title X and out of compliance with the terms and conditions” of the grant, specifically because the state health department “no longer offered pregnant clients the opportunity to be provided information and counseling about abortion/pregnancy termination.”

Oklahoma attempted to “find an agreeable solution with the Health Department that would allow the Health Department to continue receiving Title X funds while complying with Oklahoma law prohibiting abortions,” the lawsuit said.

The state was “unable to find a solution allowing compliance with the regulation and Oklahoma law,” the suit said. The White House ultimately redistributed the Title X funds, including to an out-of-state provider.

“The federal government’s sole justification for disrupting decades of health services and determining that an out-of-state entity in Missouri was in the best position to provide necessary health services to citizens in the state of Oklahoma is that the Health Department refuses to approve of referrals for abortions,” the suit states.

State Attorney General Gentner Drummond said the Biden administration “is intent on punishing Oklahoma because we do not share its liberal philosophy.”

“It is patently discriminatory to deny Oklahoma these critical funds, particularly when federal law makes it clear that Title X cannot be used for abortion,” he said.

“I will continue to fight against federal overreach in all forms,” he added.

After Biden withdrew the funds, “HHS has chosen to prioritize abortion instead of prioritizing actual health care,” federal lawmakers from Oklahoma responded Thursday in a letter to HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra.

The pro-life lawmakers said the Title X grants provide health care to about 30,000 people every year in Oklahoma, and revoking the funds puts their health at risk. Now, innocent people are “caught in the crossfire of HHS’ continued work to promote abortion,” they told the federal agency, according to The Federalist.

The letter, signed by U.S. Sens. James Lankford and Markwayne Mullin, and U.S. Reps. Josh Brecheen, Stephanie Bice, Kevin Hern, Frank Lucas and Tom Cole, demanded that HHS restore the funds and help Oklahomans access health care.

What’s more, they said the Biden administration based its defunding decision on its own “willfully ignorant” misinterpretation of federal law.

Title X funds are not supposed to be used for abortions. The program provides family planning services to low-income individuals, and the law states that grants may not be used “where abortion is a method of family planning.” In 2021, however, the Biden administration implemented a new rule that contradicts the law and requires Title X recipients to refer for abortions. A dozen states sued to challenge the pro-abortion rule, but it remains in effect.

Oklahoma lawmakers said their low-income residents shouldn’t be denied health care because their state protects unborn babies’ lives.

“Abortion is not family planning; it is family destruction,” they told Becerra. “Every abortion takes an unborn child’s life. Oklahoma’s laws protect women and unborn children from the violence of abortion in the interest of promoting families, keeping Oklahomans safe, and protecting life.”

Abortion activists and Democrats have been accusing pro-life states of providing inadequate health care and driving away doctors, but these very same people are trying to stop pro-life states from providing better health care to their residents.

Texas is another example. In 2022, the Biden administration denied a bipartisan request from the Texas Legislature to expand Medicaid for mothers of newborns.

Texas was the first state to protect unborn babies by banning most abortions in 2021. Now, the state bans all elective abortions, and pro-life advocates and lawmakers are working to expand support services for families in need.

Essential health care should be an issue that Republicans and Democrats, pro-life and pro-abortion activists can work together on. But the Biden administration is playing politics with people’s lives instead.

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