NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) 鈥� A federal appeals court has shot down Tennessee's attempt to collect millions of dollars in family planning funds without complying with federal rules requiring clinics to provide abortion referrals due to .
Last year, Tennessee's Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti filed a the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' decision to disqualify the state from receiving money offered through a family planning program known as Title X. A lower court later determined that Tennessee was unlikely to succeed and the state appealed that decision.
In 2021, the Biden administration announced that clinics that accept Title X funds must offer information about abortion. However, Skrmetti鈥檚 argued that HHS did not alert officials how the rule would apply in states with abortion bans now allowed under the U.S. Supreme Court's 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Yet the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals argued in a ruling Monday that Tennessee could not use its abortion ban law to 鈥渄ictate eligibility requirements鈥� for Title X funding. The 31-page ruling means the federal government will not reinstate Tennessee鈥檚 Title X funding while the lawsuit continues through the courts.
Furthermore, the appeals court said that the state was not obligated to accept the money and noted that the Tennessee Legislature approved of replacing the lost federal dollars with state funding.
鈥淭ennessee was free to voluntarily relinquish the grants for any reason, especially if it determined that the requirements would violate its state laws,鈥� the ruling stated.
A spokesperson for Skrmetti's office said they were 鈥渞eviewing the opinion and considering next steps.鈥�
Tennessee has been a recipient of the program since it launched in 1970, recently collecting around $7.1 million annually to help nearly 100 clinics provide birth control and basic health care services mainly to low-income women, many of them from minority communities.
Under the latest rule, clinics cannot use federal family planning money to pay for abortions, but they must offer information about abortion at the patient鈥檚 request.
Tennessee bans abortion at all stages of pregnancy but includes some narrow exceptions.
In March of 2023, HHS informed Tennessee health officials that the state was out of Title X compliance because of its policy barring clinics from providing information on pregnancy termination options that weren鈥檛 legal in the state 鈥� effectively prohibiting any discussions on elective abortions. The state defended its policy and refused to back down, causing the federal government to declare that continuing Tennessee鈥檚 Title X money was 鈥渘ot in the best interest of the government.鈥�
HHS later announced that Tennessee鈥檚 Title X funds would largely be directed to Planned Parenthood, the leading provider of abortions in the United States, which would distribute the money to its clinics located in Tennessee.
"Millions of people across the country rely on essential care 鈥� like birth control, STI screenings and treatment, cancer screenings, and other key sexual and reproductive health care services 鈥� funded by Title X," said Ashley Coffield, CEO of Planned Parenthood of Tennessee and North Mississippi in a statement. 鈥淭he state鈥檚 decision not to comply with all-options counseling is playing politics with our bodies.鈥�
Kimberlee Kruesi, The Associated Press
