Attorney General Gentner Drummond on Tuesday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review an appellate court’s decision upholding the Biden Administration’s suspension of a family planning grant that Oklahoma has received for more than 40 years.
After the landmark Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade, Oklahoma declined to provide abortion referrals under Title X, which itself prohibits Title X funds from being used for abortion. However, the Biden-Harris Administration decided to deny millions of dollars in funding to the Oklahoma State Department of Health solely because of Oklahoma’s refusal, and instead gave the Title X grant money to pro-abortion groups.
In July, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit sided with the Biden-Harris Administration, ruling incorrectly that – despite clear mandates protecting Oklahoma’s decision in federal law – the federal government was not required to award grant funding to a state health department that does not offer abortion referrals.
In the petition for a writ of certiorari, Drummond wrote that the federal government’s expansive claim that it can force unwilling states to provide abortion referrals under Title X is “remarkably wrong” and “unacceptably shifts legislative power to the executive branch.” He also pointed out that the Supreme Court “has time and again granted certiorari to protect conscientious objectors and the like from federal overreach,” and urged the Court to do so here as well.
He said the suspension of grant funds risks hurting Oklahomans who are in desperate need of healthcare services such as cancer screening, breast exams, depression screening and pregnancy prevention.
“Oklahomans have depended upon these services for decades,” Drummond said. “Just because Oklahoma’s state policies clash with the liberal Biden-Harris agenda does not mean our people should be denied healthcare, particularly when federal law makes it clear that Title X cannot be used for abortion.”
Drummond is asking the justices to grant certiorari for two key reasons. First, the Tenth Circuit did not comply with Supreme Court precedents and split with multiple circuits by claiming that mere regulations can provide clarity that is otherwise lacking in a Spending Clause statute. In addition, the Weldon Amendment prohibits the federal government from discriminating against a state health department that declines to give abortion referrals.
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