Planned Parenthood clinics in Wisconsin will stop providing abortions on Wednesday, as the organization’s centers across the country struggle to navigate the fallout of a law that blocks the the reproductive healthcare giant from receiving reimbursements from Medicaid.
Thanks to a provision in Donald Trump’s new tax and spending bill, abortion providers that receive more than $800,000 in reimbursements from Medicaid, the US government’s insurance program for low-income people, are blocked from participating in the program for one year. That provision is so narrowly tailored that it applies almost exclusively to Planned Parenthood, long a conservative target.
It is already illegal to use federal Medicaid dollars to pay for most abortions. Instead, Planned Parenthood clinics rely on Medicaid to pay for services like cancer screenings, STI tests and contraception.
By ending its abortion provision, Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin appears to be attempting to continue receiving Medicaid reimbursements for those other services. The measure is intended to be temporary, the regional affiliate said in a statement.
“This was always the intent of the Trump administration’s law to ‘defund’ Planned Parenthood: sow chaos and confusion, shut down Planned Parenthood health centers, strip access to essential health care from patients, and make it harder for everyone, everywhere to get an abortion – even in states where it’s legal,” a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the organization’s national office, said in a statement. “This is the chaos they wanted to see.”
Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin is believed to be the first affiliate to cease providing abortions in a state where the procedure remains legal. Autonomy News first reported the news of the suspension.
At least two independent abortion providers are still open in Wisconsin. However, a consortium of abortion rights supporters in neighboring Illinois said in a statement that they “stand ready” to receive people traveling from Wisconsin for abortions.
Without Medicaid, Planned Parenthood estimates that up to 200 of its clinics may be forced to close. More than 60% of the clinics at risk for closure are in rural or “medically under-served areas”, while roughly 90% of the clinics are located in blue states that protect abortion rights.
Maine and Washington state have allocated money to Planned Parenthood affiliates to cover the shortfall caused by the defunding provision. (Maine is also sending money to Maine Family Planning, another abortion provider that was also defunded by Trump’s tax and spending bill.) Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood affiliates in Kentucky and Oregon have said that they will try to see Medicaid patients for free for as long as possible.
But that’s not a sustainable plan, according to Sara Kennedy, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette in Oregon. Prior to the passage of Trump’s bill, about 70% of the affiliate’s patients used Medicaid. Now, the affiliate anticipates losing upwards of $12m in Medicaid revenue over the next year.
“Every day we are seeing hundreds to thousands of Medicaid patients and we are not getting reimbursed for any of those services. So that is unsustainable for any business,” Kennedy said. “If the state doesn’t step in urgently to be able to support and protect reproductive healthcare access, there will be no other choice except for us to start charging patients.”
Many clinics were already facing dire financial straits even before Trump’s tax and spending bill. This year, at least 20 Planned Parenthood clinics across seven states have shuttered or have announced plans to close soon.
