The Trump administration says it will invest 200 200 million in California’s Medicaid fund more than it needs abortion insurance.


“We are taking enforcement action against the state of California for imposing a global abortion coverage order on the state’s health insurance,” Azar said. “We have informed California that this policy clearly violates federal conscience laws, but the state refuses to correct the issue and comply with it.”

California Governor Gavin Newsum, a Democrat, accuses the Trump administration of “threatening California’s health only with cheap political issues – and during a global epidemic,” vowing to continue to stand up for reproductive health. The identity of this extreme president. “

Azar added that his department would continue to withhold 200 200 million for each additional quarter that the state does not comply with – although it is unclear how Azar will remain in his current role for less than 2021 and if the president-elect . Biden’s administration does not seem likely to continue the policy.

In the same incident, Principal Deputy Associate Attorney General Claire McCusker Murray announced that a lawsuit was filed at the University of Vermont Medical Center by the Justice Department’s civil rights department early Wednesday after the agency was forced to take part in a nurse. His objections.

CNN has reached out to the University of Vermont Medical Center for comment. The medical center has argued in the past that the nurse’s allegations are false and that the HHS has been used to support the religious rights of employees as well as the legal rights of patients. Office is ready to work with Fees for Civil Rights (OCR).

These two steps reaffirm the administration’s continued focus on the religious and ethical objections of healthcare providers to healthcare controversy, such as abortion, under President Donald Trump’s study. The department created an End 2018 Karan and Religious Freedom Department in January 2018.

In 2019, the agency issued a so-called end-of-conscience rule that would not allow health care workers to choose to assist in certain medical procedures, such as abortion, sterilization and suicide, citing moral or religious reasons. Reproductive rights advocates argued that the rule would harm people in the LGBTQ community. He feared the religious freedom argument would be used to bring justice to endangered patients, and a federal judge in New York blocked the enforcement last year.

When asked about the timing of the California move given to the outgoing administration, H.H.S. Roger Severino, director of the Office of Civil Rights, said in a press call on Wednesday that “the right to conscience is not for partisan debate. It doesn’t matter who is president. It doesn’t matter who is the director of office fees for civil rights, whether it’s me or someone else.” – Congress deserves to enforce laws passed on a bilateral basis. “

OCR California’s Attorney General Xavier Besera has been at the forefront of California’s abortion insurance cover with Biden’s selection for the upcoming Secretary of Health and Human Services. Besera’s office fee said Wednesday afternoon that it had “received no official information from the HHS on the matter.”
The OCRA found in January that California’s requirement that state-regulated health plans cover abortions “discriminate against health care plans and issuers, or else, limit or exclude abortion limits in their plan products.” The department found that violations of the Weldon Amendment, which barred any program or state government from funding federally, “subject any institutional or individual health care institution to discrimination on the grounds that the health care entity does not provide, pays, or provide coverage. Make up., Or refer to abortion. “
Besera responded with a letter in February stating that in 2016, the OCR discovered that “the protection of the Weldon Reform extends only to health care institutions” and that California exempted a health care institution in 2015. “Given this fact, as the OCRA itself has recognized, California is not subject to any healthcare organization prohibited under the Weldon Amendment,” Besera wrote at the time.

When asked by CNN about Besra’s defense, Severino said California’s religious groups, which have raised the issue of the need for abortion, are “the real victims of the victims here and it is up to the state to correct them.”

“Whatever method they choose to address the issues raised there by the complaints, we will not allow those seeking abortion-free coverage under the law and their specific method to ensure that abortion-free coverage is available to them. “He said.

Severino ignored CNN’s question about the time it would take to cut 200 million dollars in Medicaid aid amid a deteriorating coronavirus epidemic.

Sarah Rosenbum, a professor of health law and policy at George W. Washington University in Washington, who worked for former President Bill Clinton, said that in light of the declining Trump presidency, “politically, practically, it’s just a threat, but legally it’s a There is a real danger. “

“When you start a whole brand new agency, when whole departments are standing, they’re getting into a fountain of issues,” she said, adding that the Biden administration is facing California policy, adding that “it’s worth taking.” There will be (court) defense so that nothing happens. Because turning the wheels and turning the wheels and turning the wheel inside the agency is a complex matter to do in a procedural and legal way. “

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