A federal appeals court has given the Trump administration the green light to move forward with a controversial provision that would choke off Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood.
The First Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston hit pause on a lower court order that had temporarily shielded the organization, siding instead with the government’s push to enforce a measure tucked inside the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act. That law blocks tax-exempt groups and their affiliates from accessing Medicaid if they provide abortions.
The lower court judge who first intervened, Indira Talwani, had ruled the provision likely ran afoul of the Constitution by singling out Planned Parenthood for punishment. But the appeals court, without explanation, swept her injunction aside.
Planned Parenthood warns the decision is a dagger aimed at its network of nearly 600 health centers, nearly 200 of which could shutter across 24 states. More than a million patients, the group says, now face the prospect of losing access to care through their Medicaid coverage.
The administration has argued the law is neither unconstitutional nor extreme, insisting that stripping federal subsidies is far removed from the kind of “punishments” the Constitution forbids under the bill of attainder clause.
Planned Parenthood vows to keep fighting. “This court has allowed the law to hit patients, but the battle isn’t over,” said its president, Alexis McGill Johnson.
For now, the stay means Trump’s signature legislation can roll forward, its most divisive provision looming over the future of reproductive health access in America.
