The American Civil Liberties Union — including its branches in Southern California and San Diego — Friday sued the Trump administration over newly announced limits to the Affordable Care Act’s contraception coverage rules, a change that could cut free access to birth control for hundreds of thousands of women.
The new regulation, issued by the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, expands the group of employers and insurers allowed to exempt themselves from covering contraceptives on religious or moral grounds.
The lawsuit was filed in San Francisco federal court on behalf of members of the ACLU and Service Employee International Union-United Health Care Workers West, who contend they are at risk of losing their birth control insurance coverage because of where they work or where they go to school.
The filing came hours after HHS announced the change stemming from new Justice Department guidance concerning the 2010 health-care law.
“Birth control is basic health care,” Sue Dunlap, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Los Angeles, told City News Service.
“Nine out of 10 women of reproductive age will use it in their lifetime,” she said. “Thanks to expanded access to contraception, we are at the lowest rate of unintended pregnancy in 30 years. Access to birth control has opened up educational and career opportunities for women.”
“The Trump Administration’s rule takes us backward, undermining women’s health yet again,” she said. “But no matter what, Planned Parenthood remains committed to serving the thousands of people who rely on us each day for their care — including birth control.”
The roll back fulfills one of President Donald J. Trump’s campaign promises.
The Trump administration is forcing women to pay for their boss’s religious beliefs,” ACLU senior staff attorney Brigitte Amiri said in a statement. We’re filing this lawsuit because the federal government cannot authorize discrimination against women in the name of religion or otherwise.”
Named plaintiff Kate Rochat, an ACLU member and student at Indiana’s Notre Dame Law School — which bills itself as the nation’s oldest Catholic law school — said she expects she will lose her access to contraceptive health care because of the rule.
No woman should ever be denied health care because her employer or university’s religious views are prioritized over her serious medical needs,” Rochat said.
In the lawsuit, the ACLU argues that the interim rules violate the Establishment Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution by authorizing and promoting religiously motivated and other discrimination against women seeking reproductive health care.
“With the stroke of a pen, the Trump administration has shamelessly attempted to rip away the rights of untold numbers of women to receive essential healthcare, under the warped facade of `religious freedom’,” said Dave Regan, president of SEIU-UHW. “Apparently, `religious freedom’ to this administration is the freedom to allow bosses to make medical decisions for and discriminate against female employees.”
“Women in the workplace need compassionate care, not doors slammed in their faces by their employers,” he said.
–City News Service