Posts Tagged ‘abortion funding’
In the News
January 19, 2010More Taxpayer Funding of Abortion in the Senate Health Bill
The Nelson-Reid agreement on abortion is not the only source of taxpayer funding for abortion. An obscure addition to the Senate version of health care reform that was adopted on Christmas Eve is a gift package with unexpected contents: even more taxpayer funding of elective abortions. According to a new analysis just released by National Right to Life Committee legislative director Doug Johnson, Sec. 10503 of the Reid “Manager’s Amendment” to H.R. 3590 directly appropriates funds for community health centers (CHCs). These funds would not be covered by the annual abortion funding limitation known as the Hyde Amendment or by any other existing limitation.
The funding amounts are huge – $7 billion over five years, beginning with $700,000,000 in the fiscal year that begins October 1, 2010. The fact that H.R. 3590 appropriates these funds directly means that they will not be included in the annual Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS) spending bill, even though the community health center money is appropriated by H.R. 3590 to the HHS Department. Moreover, the underlying authorizing law for community health centers, 42 U.S.C. 254b and Section 330 of the Public Health Services Act, contains no language limiting abortion funding, and it is unlikely in the extreme that the Obama Administration would administratively rule such funding out-of-bounds in future CHC grant-making. (more…)
Tags: abortion funding, manager's amendment, Sen. Ben Nelson, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid
In the News
January 8, 2010Abortion Language in Obamacare
There are at lease six key differences that need to be resolved before the House and Senate can cut a deal, in secret, to pass Obamacare. Maybe the most difficult issue to resolve is the issue of using federal tax dollars to fund abortion. It seems clear, from a reading of the House- and Senate-passed health care bills, that their positions on the federal funding of abortion are at odds and will be difficult to reconcile.
During the House debate, an amendment was added by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI) (the Stupak Amendment) by a 240-194 vote that states the following: “No funds authorized or appropriated under this Act (or an Amendment made by this Act) may be used to pay for any abortion or to cover any part of the costs of any health plan that includes coverage for abortion.” There are exceptions in this prohibition for the life of the mother, rape and incest. The prohibition specifically allows states to buy abortion coverage if they so choose, provided they do not use federal funds, any funds derived from federal subsidies under Obamacare, or any nonfederal funds needed to access another federal program. This is easy to understand language and reflects the annual funding rider on appropriations bills, commonly referred to as the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal tax dollars from funding abortion. This language was supported by pro-life groups and is widely considered very strong language protecting the taxpayers from funding abortions. (more…)
Tags: abortion funding, manager's amendment, ObamaCare, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Stupak amendment
In the News
December 30, 2009Reid Roils the Abortion Debate
Far from maintaining the Hyde Amendment limitations on federal abortion funding, the Harry Reid (D-NV) “manager’s amendment” on which cloture has now been invoked in the Senate would begin to tear down the firewall that individual taxpayers now enjoy in various federal programs not to participate in abortion funding; establish a line-item process so that employees in many states will see a special “abortion debit” on their pay check stubs; create new health insurance plans offered through the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), one of which will almost certainly offer elective abortions; and open up a 50-state battle on abortion funding that could lead to the all-or-nothing inclusion or exclusion of such funding in each state.
The language included in the bill is not the “Casey compromise” that was floated over late last week on Capitol Hill in an effort to garner the support of Ben Nelson of Nebraska, who offered the Nelson-Hatch amendment rejected by the Senate 54-45 on December 8. Casey’s amendment, which failed to break the deadlock over abortion funding in the Senate bill and was strongly opposed by the national right to life groups and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, included two features that have been omitted in Reid’s manager’s amendment: a codification of the House-approved Weldon conscience language and an individual opt-out from abortion coverage. (more…)
Tags: abortion funding, Hyde amendment, Majority Leader Harry Reid, manager's amendment
Key Documents
October 8, 2009U.S. Catholic Bishops Warn Congress on Health Reform
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops today sent a letter to the House of Representatives and Senate to warn lawmakers that the church would oppose a final bill if it did not do the following:
– Exclude mandated coverage for abortion and incorporate longstanding policies against abortion funding that are in favor of conscience rights.
– Adopt measures that protect and and improve people’s health care.
– Include effective measures to safeguard the health of legal immigrants, their children and all of society.
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