Companies and other employers who today are given a moral exemption from providing contraceptive services in their health insurance plans could soon be forced to provide those services under a proposed rule from the Biden administration that says pro-lifers are unfair and possibly illegal.
The Department of Health and Human Services on Monday announced plans to repeal a Trump-era rule requiring employers who have moral objections to that requirement to offer health insurance plans from Obamacare. Employers who oppose contraception would still be allowed to not offer contraception coverage under Biden’s bill.
Religious liberty groups describe the proposed legislation as an administrative attempt by Democrats to force employers to provide contraception after failed court efforts, most notably in the Supreme Court’s Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania. Matt Bowman, senior counsel at the Alliance for Freedom Advocacy, said the Supreme Court case shows that exempting contraceptives from companies with moral objections is permissible, and that the Biden administration is trying to do what it can’t do now through executive power. Courts.
“Their idea is that it’s illegal to hold moral positions against the Biden administration and use taxpayer dollars to bail out political allies,” Bowman told Fox News Digital. “This is a desperate raid and defunding of Planned Parenthood.”
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The Biden administration announced plans Monday to repeal a Trump-era law that allows health care providers to offer contraceptive services ethically.
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The Alliance Defending Freedom In 2020, the Trump administration successfully overcame challenges related to ethics exemptions. Bowman suggested that a victory could be grounds for an argument that the Biden administration could fall because it unfairly allows religious exemptions, but not morally.
“The Biden administration is building this on a house of cards,” Bowman told Fox News Digital. “They have no legal authority to enforce this order.”
HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said the contraceptive law comes at a time when women’s health is at risk.
The Biden-Harris administration will ensure that women everywhere get the birth control they need, when they need it, and — thanks to the ACA — “Now more than ever, access to and coverage of birth control is more important. [Affordable Care Act or Obamacare] – without out-of-pocket costs,” Becerra said.
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HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said the birth control rule comes at a time when women’s health is at risk.
(Photographer: Amanda Andrade-Rhodes/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Melanie Israel, a policy analyst at the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Life, Religion and Family at the Heritage Foundation, said the Biden administration is using the Roe reversal by Dobbs and Jackson Women’s Health to justify its actions.
“We saw a concerted effort to oppose the Dobbs decision,” Israel told Fox News Digital. The Biden administration is now back and they’re still going to take them away even though these moral exemptions have been ruled a formality by the Supreme Court.
HHS officials estimate more than 100 employers and approximately 125,000 workers will be affected by the proposed rules, which would end the conduct exemption.
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Religious freedom experts say the Biden administration’s birth control rules run counter to legal precedent.
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Terry Schilling, president of the Project on American Principles, said it was unclear how much the Biden administration would use the proposed legislation against organizations that oppose contraception on moral as opposed to religious grounds.
“How do Washington bureaucrats make this distinction?” Terry told Fox News Digital. “It’s scary to think how this writing gap can be abused and hurt.”
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Rep. Dan Pope, R-N.C., said the Biden administration has no right to force organizations to cover services they morally object to.
“The Biden administration is playing with fire,” Bishop told Fox News Digital. “This should be simple: no individual or organization should be forced to violate the constitutionally protected freedom of conscience. This is a clear message from the administration to Americans of faith and to anyone who dares to oppose an active, progressive agenda that they oppose the full power of the federal government.