The Obama administration, in a move designed to bolster its backers by blackmailing its opponents, announced on Friday that it would withdraw funding for a Texas program that offers birth control and other health services to low-income women who do not qualify for Medicaid.
A Health and Human Services spokeswoman stated that funding was cut because the program excluded Planned Parenthood from participating. Planned Parenthood, which donates millions of dollars to the Democratic Party, lost its funding in Texas last year because the legislature was fed up with the organization’s performing of abortions, as well as its excessive cost.
According to federal law, states administer Medicaid and reserve the right to set the criteria for “qualified providers.” As Planned Parenthood represents less than two percent of providers in Texas, yet has a cost 43 percent higher than most other providers, it was an unlikely choice as a “quality provider.”
After Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced the decision in Houston, Texas Governor Rick Perry angrily denounced the decision as “egregious federal overreach” and also stated, “The fact that the Obama Administration would announce its decision to deny care for more than 100,000 low income women during a press event before giving official notice to the state is a clear demonstration of the political motivation behind this decision.”
The removal of funding by the Obama administration will now prevent roughly 130,000 low-income Texas women who do not qualify for Medicaid from receiving free exams and contraceptives. Four other states have also attempted to block federal aid to Planned Parenthood: North Carolina, Tennessee, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
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