Thursday July 29, 2010
Congressional Report: ObamaCare Allows Abortion Funding
13 Senators urge HHS: bar abortion funding “immediately”
By Kathleen Gilbert
WASHINGTON, D.C., July 29, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A report by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) issued Friday has confirmed that the structures created under the new federal health care bill will in fact fund abortions with federal dollars – prompting a group of senators to demand that Hyde-amendment restrictions be instituted immediately.
The CRS report answered several questions from the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions on the exact status of elective abortion funding under the new high risk insurance pools; the report took into account President Obama’s Executive Order on abortion funding and Health and Human Services directives on state proposals.
The high-risk pools are temporary structures meant to cover at-risk individuals until the new health insurance exchange starts in 2014.
The authors of the report confirm what top pro-life analysts strongly warned both before and after the health care bill’s passage: that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) fails to specifically exclude elective abortion according to Hyde-amendment regulations from federal subsidizing.
While PPACA “does not specify what benefits may or may not be subsidized with federal funds appropriated” for the high risk pools, states the report, “Abortion restrictions included in section 1303 of PPACA, as amended by section 10104 of the Act, would not appear to apply specifically to the funds made available for high risk pools.”
The inquiry came after the National Right to Life Committee this month revealed that Pennsylvania’s high risk insurance pool proposal, which would have been fully funded by the federal government, would have allowed coverage of all abortions legal in the state. Suspicion grew after it was discovered that Hyde-amendment restrictions were similarly lacking in New Mexico’s and Maryland’s proposals.
However, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) quickly issued a statement declaring that elective abortions would not be funded in the pools.
While the HHS statement suggested that such a ban was already provided by PPACA and “the President’s related Executive Order more generally,” the CRS has confirmed that such was not the case.
According to the report, Obama’s Executive Order ostensibly prohibiting federal funding of abortions under the new law “does not specifically address high risk pools and the funds provided,” but instead handles the health insurance exchanges and the community health centers addressed in other sections of the health care law. The authors also confirm that the HHS request for proposals for state high risk pools “neither explicitly provide the authority to cover elective abortions with federal funds, nor do they specifically prohibit the use of federal funds.”
An additional blow was dealt to the argument that the Hyde amendment itself already applies to the whole health care bill. This argument was frequently used by proponents of the bill who claimed that further language banning abortion funds merely represented, in the words of Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), a “belt and suspenders” approach to the issue.
The decades-old amendment, which is currently in effect under the appropriations measure for the Departments of Labor, HHS, and Education, “would not seem to apply to the funds provided for the high risk pools,” stated the report.
In response to the CRS report, thirteen U.S. Senators have sent a letter to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius urging that the department take steps to block public funds from covering elective abortion “as soon as possible.”
“We urge you to act immediately to prohibit all states operating Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plans from covering elective abortions,” state the senators. “Absent such contractual requirements, it will be necessary for Congress to modify the current law to include restrictions to prevent federal dollars from being used to prevent such coverage.”
The letter was signed by Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee ranking member Sen. Michael B. Enzi, Wyoming Republican, and 12 other GOP senators.
The lawmakers requested a response by Friday.