Trump ruling expected to have little impact on local Planned Parenthood services
EL CENTRO — After the Trump administration ruled taxpayer-funded family planning clinics must stop referring women for abortions immediately, California Planned Parenthood facilities, including the one here, chose not to accept funding from the government.
The Health and Human Services Department formally notified the clinics that it will begin enforcing the ban on abortion referrals, along with a requirement that family-planning clinics maintain separate finances from facilities that provide abortions. Another requirement that both kinds of facilities cannot be under the same roof would take effect next year.
Cita Walsh, Pacific Southwest vice president of marketing and communication for Planned Parenthood said the organization opposes the gag rule and has decided not to accept any Title X funding, so it can continue providing the same services, including referring women to abortion clinics.
She said in a written statement that the Trump-Pence administration’s implementation of the “gag rule,” making it illegal for health care providers in the
Title X program to refer patients for abortion, undermines basic rights to access health care.
She said although the Title X gag rule will likely affect many parts of the country, California has strong protections in place that will allow Planned Parenthood to continue to provide high-quality health care.
“This doesn’t affect Planned Parenthood in California because we are able to provide services without Title X funding,” she said. “Our doors are still open. The Imperial Valley Family Care Center will not be affected by this.”
She said Planned Parenthood in other states might struggle a little without the Title X funding. Before the ruling, Planned Parenthood in the Pacific Southwest received Title X funding,
The Planned Parenthood in El Centro is the only facility that provides abortions for some distance. Yuma’s Planned Parenthood facility closed a few years ago.
Walsh said the ruling interferes with women being told all of the available options.
“You can’t have a government telling you what you can do,” she said, adding that they will fight the gag rule.
The rule, she said, would prohibit doctors, nurses, hospitals, and health centers across the country from referring patients for safe and legal abortion.
Previously, all Planned Parenthood offices used Title X funding, she said.
Ultimately, this rule is designed to block people from obtaining health care from Planned Parenthood, leaving many with nowhere else to get care, she said.
Imperial Valley Coalition for Life board member Angel Ash Ashbrook said the ruling reinforces that abortions are not family planning.
“It already has been decided a long time ago that abortions are not going to be family service,” Ashbrook said Ashbrook said she was happy to see the ruling.
“They should not have qualified for it,” she said. “They are not a health care provider. It was not intended for abortion providers.”
While Ashbrook is pleased with the ruling, she thinks very few, if any, abortion providers will feel the effects.
“The truth is it’s a great step, but I think they will barely feel it,” she said, “They make billions in abortions, but it is a step in the right direction.”
Christ Community Church Senior Pastor Chris Nunn also was pleased with the ruling from the Trump administration
“I don’t think it’s appropriate to use state or federal money for a practice people morally object to,” Nunn said. “It violates the conscience of so many people who oppose abortion.”
Nunn said he was not aware that the local Planned Parenthood along with others in the Pacific Southwest will no longer use Title X funding.
Walsh said that, in California, nearly 1 million low-income patients have received critical life-saving screenings, birth control and other essential services through Title X.
She said its Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest doors will stay open and offer the same services, just not with the Title X funding.
“We will continue to provide health care services to our patients including abortion, birth control, cervical cancer screenings, STD testing and treatment, breast exams, emergency contraception, annual exams, men’s health services and more.”
The head of a national umbrella group representing the clinics said the Trump administration is following “an ideological agenda” that could disrupt basic health care for many low-income women.