Anti-Planned Parenthood budget bill could cost Ohio $9.8 Million in federal funds

As our Budget Watcher noted, the big news from the Legislature today was a vote to effectively defund Planned Parenthood.  , the Republicans sought to “avoid constitutional issues” by placing “Planned Parenthood at the back of the line for money rather than defunding it entirely.”

Don’t believe it.

The law passed has a number of significant legal and constitutional consequences.  The  that the Ohio plan is modeled after a law passed in Texas.  So Texas provides a pretty good example of what to expect.

Others can discuss why this is a really bad idea from a policy standpoint.  I will focus here on the legal aspects.

If this bill becomes a law, Texas shows that two bad things will happen to Ohio.

First, as we noted back in February, this law is unconstitutional.  We won’t repeat the whole post here – but here is the summary:  a federal judge has already ruled that a state plan to reallocate federal family planning in a way that leaves little or no money for Planned Parenthood or similar groups violates the Free Speech, Association, and Due Process rights of Planned Parenthood.  This is because the law is designed to punish Planned Parenthood for its advocacy of abortion rights and provision of constitutionally protected medical services.

Last week, .  The claim in the lawsuit is precisely what the other federal  ruled:  that the new Texas law was intended to silence individuals or groups who support abortion rights and thereby violated their constitutional rights.  The .  A law professor from the University of Houston noted that “Planned Parenthood has a strong case.”  Another professor from Texas Tech said that if the Texas court follows the line of reasoning as other courts, “it probably will find that the state is violating the First Amendment.”

This means:  Ohio will likely spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal expenses defending a law that likely will be found to be unconstitutional.

Second, as we noted back in February, this action violates Federal law.  Federal law provides that service providers, like Planned Parenthood, may not be excluded from funding simply because they separately provide abortion services (which already cannot be paid for with federal money).  .  The Department of Health and Human Services determined that, because of this law, Texas was no longer eligible to receive funds that paid for these services for about 130,000 Texas women.