Supreme Court Allows South Carolina to Defund Planned Parenthood

The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that South Carolina is allowed to block Medicaid funding from going to Planned Parenthood clinics in the state.

The case was brought by Planned Parenthood South Atlantic and a Medicaid patient after South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) signed an executive order in 2018 seeking to exclude the abortion giant from its Medicaid program. The abortion organization argued the order violated federal law and contended that Medicaid patients had a right to sue the state under Section 1983, part of the Civil Right Act of 1871, to choose their own qualified healthcare provider.

The Supreme Court issued a 6-3 decision disagreeing with Planned Parenthood’s arguments and siding with South Carolina, essentially allowing the state to defund Planned Parenthood after being blocked from doing so for years by lower courts.

“Section 1983 permits private plaintiffs to sue for violations of federal spending-power statutes only in ‘atypical’ situations … where the provision in question ‘clear[ly]’ and ‘unambiguous[ly]’ confers an individual ‘right,’” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in the majority opinion, adding that the law in question “is not such a statute.”  

“After all, the decision whether to let private plaintiffs enforce a new statutory right poses delicate questions of public policy,” Gorsuch continued. “New rights for some mean new duties for others. And private enforcement actions, meritorious or not, can force governments to direct money away from public services and spend it instead on litigation. The job of resolving how best to weigh those competing costs and benefits belongs to the people’s elected representatives, not unelected judges charged with applying the law as they find it.”

Liberal-leaning Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote dissent joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, calling the majority’s opinion a “narrow and ahistorical reading” of Section 1983.

“That venerable provision permits any citizen to obtain redress in federal court for ‘the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws’ of the United States,” Jackson wrote. “South Carolina asks us to hollow out that provision so that the State can evade liability for violating the rights of its Medicaid recipients to choose their own doctors.”

While federal funding for abortions specifically is barred by the Hyde Amendment, pro-life opponents argue no federal funds should be used to prop up any organization that performs abortions. South Carolina notably bans abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, the point when a fetal heartbeat can typically be detected, with limited exceptions. 

There are two Planned Parenthood clinics in the state, one in Columbia and one in Charleston. Planned Parenthood argued the case is about general healthcare, not abortion, contending that low-income patients would be unable to access services like gynecological exams, birth control, cancer screenings, and testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

“The conservative group Alliance Defending Freedom has argued that a win for South Carolina would still mean Medicaid patients could go to one of 200 other publicly funded healthcare clinics in the state,” Fox News noted. 

The Supreme Court ultimately reversed a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit siding with Planned Parenthood.

Pro-life groups praised the Supreme Court’s ruling, saying Planned Parenthood “was rightly disqualified.”

“By rejecting Planned Parenthood’s lawfare, the Court not only saves countless unborn babies from a violent death and their mothers from dangerously shoddy ‘care,’ it also protects Medicaid from exposure to thousands of lawsuits from unqualified providers that would jeopardize the entire program,” Susan B. Antony Pro-Life America Director of Legal Affairs and Policy Counsel Katie Daniel said.

“Pro-life Republican leaders are eliminating government waste and prioritizing Medicaid for those who need it most – women, children, the poor, people with disabilities,” she continued. “Planned Parenthood was rightly disqualified. Multi-billion-dollar abortion businesses are not entitled to an unending money grab that forces taxpayers to fund America’s #1 cause of death: abortion.”

CatholicVote President Kelsey Reinhardt called the decision a “major pro-life victory.” 

“For too long, taxpayer dollars – including those of pro-life Americans and faithful Catholics – have been used to fund an industry built on the destruction of innocent human life. No one should be forced to subsidize abortion. Life is God’s most precious gift, beginning at the moment of conception and deserving of protection until natural death,” she said.

“With today’s ruling, CatholicVote urges lawmakers to redirect support to organizations that uphold the dignity of both mother and child – especially the thousands of pregnancy resource centers that offer real help to women, without sacrificing their children or compromising their safety,” she continued. 

Planned Parenthood South Atlantic lamented the decision, and said it could enable other states to block Medicaid coverage for Planned Parenthood. 

The decision comes as Congress works to defund Planned Parenthood nationwide through budget reconciliation.

The case is Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, No. 23-1275 in the Supreme Court of the United States. 

Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.