Clinic Closures in Limbo as Courts Decide on Bill’s Constitutionality
September 1, 2025 5 minutes read
By Melinda Young
A new federal law will prohibit federal Medicaid payment for 10 years to nonprofit healthcare providers serving low-income and medically underserved individuals if the same provider “offers abortions in cases other than that of rape, incest, or life-threatening conditions for the woman,” according to the bill’s wording in Sec. 44126.1 The U.S. House of Representatives’ H.R.1 bill became public law on July 4, 2025.1
U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston, MA, blocked the federal government from cutting Medicaid payments to Planned Parenthood members in an order issued on July 28, 2025. Talwani’s new order said the disruption in healthcare could harm patients, and the federal government is blocked from excluding groups like Planned Parenthood from Medicaid reimbursements.2
Planned Parenthood sued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on July 7, 2025. They argued the government had no legitimate justification for the statute and that it was designed to attack and punish Planned Parenthood. District Court Judge Indira Talwani issued a temporary restraining order on July 7, 2025, and ordered HHS to ensure that Medicaid funding continues as customary.3 Previous federal court rulings regarding Planned Parenthood and Medicaid have resulted in the organization losing funding in Texas and South Carolina.4,5
The possible loss of Medicaid funding puts nearly 200 Planned Parenthood health centers in 24 states across the country at risk of closure, says Danika Severino Wynn, CNM, vice president of care and access for Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Wynn answered questions via email.
“More than 1.1 million patients could lose access to care, including birth control, cancer screenings, STI [sexually transmitted infection] testing and treatment, and abortion,” Wynn says.
“Defunding Planned Parenthood will hit underserved communities the hardest,” she says. “Nearly two-thirds — 60% — of at-risk health centers are located in medically underserved areas, primary care health professional shortage areas, or rural areas.”
As of late July 2025, Talwani’s restraining order was still in place.
Another change in the new bill involves the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which provides insurance to 45 million Americans. One change will make new enrollees in ACA insurance ineligible for subsidized insurance premiums unless they enroll because of a qualifying life event.3
The bill also will discontinue the expanded premium tax credit at the end of 2025, and another change says that “if a person is denied or disenrolled from Medicaid due to work requirements, they are also ineligible for subsidized Marketplace coverage.”4
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the new bill’s changes to Medicaid and the ACA will increase the number of people without health insurance by 16 million people.5
The federal government also has moved to change the mission of Title X programs that provide contraception and reproductive health services to low-income women across the United States. The change is a mission shift of Title X from contraception and STI testing at existing Title X centers to newly created infertility training centers. The new centers would promote holistic approaches to combating infertility, including classes on menstrual cycles without use of birth control or in vitro fertilization. It is unclear whether the administration will shift some of the $300 million funds from family planning centers to the new infertility clinics.6
White House spokesman Kush Desai told the New York Times in July 2025 that Title X would “continue to deliver on this mission of ensuring access to a broad range of family planning and preventive health services.”6
The new federal law cutting Medicaid payments to family planning centers echoes what happened to clinics in Texas, where the state took away state funding, says Carole Joffe, PhD, a professor at the University of California San Francisco in Oakland. Joffe is a co-author of the book After Dobbs: How the Supreme Court Ended Roe but Not Abortion, published March 25, 2025.7
Cutting contraception funding and legal abortion care in many states since 2022 has led to increases in abortions nationwide, Joffe says.6 “The numbers of abortions went up past 1 million for the first time in quite a number of years,” Joffe says. “It’s a very contradictory environment right now.”7
The state of South Carolina more recently terminated Planned Parenthood South Atlantic from its Medicaid program because it provides abortions. A lawsuit seeking to stop the state from withholding Medicaid funds made it to the U.S. Supreme Court in early 2025. The court reversed a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit and decided that Planned Parenthood and a South Carolina woman do not have a legal right to bring a lawsuit that challenges South Carolina’s decision regarding excluding Planned Parenthood from Medicaid, saying that the Medicaid Act only requires states to ensure that Medicaid patients can obtain care from any qualified provider.8
The national decision to defund Planned Parenthood would cost taxpayers more money in the long term and leave them with fewer options for getting the care they need, Wynn says.
“We know what this means: Cancers will go undetected, sexually transmitted infections will go untreated, birth control will be harder to get, and the public health infrastructure of communities will break down,” Wynn adds. “This reckless attack on Planned Parenthood will devastate communities that already face outsized barriers to healthcare — worsening our already broken healthcare system and existing health inequities.”
Sixty-four percent of Planned Parenthood health centers across the country are in rural or medically underserved areas, where healthcare shortages already are affecting residents’ access to healthcare, she notes.
“More than half of Planned Parenthood patients are enrolled in Medicaid, and without Planned Parenthood, many patients would have nowhere to turn for care,” Wynn adds.
It would not be possible for charitable donations alone to make up for Planned Parenthood’s loss of reimbursement for 1.1 million Medicaid patients. And the organization already has had major challenges related to low reimbursement rates from insurers, rising costs of providing care, and lack of state and federal funding for people with the greatest need, and more, Wynn says.
The Medicaid funding cut also will make it harder for everyone in the United States to obtain an abortion, and it will prevent millions of people from obtaining cancer screenings, STI testing and treatment, and contraception, she adds.
“Every person, no matter where they live, what kind of care they need, or how much money they have, should be able to get high-quality, affordable healthcare,” Wynn says.
Melinda Young has been a healthcare and medical writer for 30 years. She currently writes about contraceptive technology.
References
1. H.R.1 — One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Congress.gov. https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/1/summary/00
2. Kruesi K. A federal judge just dealt a blow to RFK Jr.’s strategy to defund Planned Parenthood. Fortune. July 28, 2025. https://fortune.com/2025/07/28/planned-parenthood-medicaid-funds-judge-indira-talwani-rfk-jr/
3. Folk Z. Judge temporarily blocks government from ‘defunding’ Planned Parenthood. Forbes. July 7, 2025. https://www.forbes.com/sites/zacharyfolk/2025/07/07/judge-temporarily-blocks-government-from-defunding-planned-parenthood/
4. Health provisions in the 2025 federal budget reconciliation bill. KFF. Updated on July 8, 2025. https://www.kff.org/tracking-the-affordable-care-act-provisions-in-the-2025-budget-bill/
5. Congressional Budget Office letter to the U.S. Congress. June 4, 2025. https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2025-06/Wyden-Pallone-Neal_Letter_6-4-25.pdf
6. Kitchener C, Stolberg SG. Under Trump, a new focus for a birth control program: Helping women get pregnant. The New York Times. July 18, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/18/us/politics/under-trump-a-new-focus-for-a-birth-control-program-helping-women-get-pregnant.html
7. Cohen DS, Joffe C. How the Supreme Court Ended Roe but Not Abortion. Beacon Press. March 25, 2025.
8. Howe A. Court decides against Planned Parenthood. SCOTUS.blog. June 26, 2025. https://www.scotusblog.com/2025/06/court-decides-against-planned-parenthood/
The possible loss of Medicaid funding puts nearly 200 Planned Parenthood health centers in 24 states across the country at risk of closure.
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