Pringles commercial airs most pro-life ad of the Super Bowl

Washington D.C., Mar 12, 2020 / 04:00 pm (CNA).- The State Department released its annual human rights report on Wednesday, offering the administration’s summary of the situation in nearly 200 countries worldwide for the last year.

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Washington D.C., Dec 23, 2019 / 03:00 pm (CNA).- The U.S. bishops have welcomed changes to the way abortion coverage is billed in some federally-funded health plan exchanges, saying the changes will allow Americans to choose health care plans consistent with their views.

Those who purchase health plans “have a right to know if they are paying for elective abortion,” said Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City in Kansas, chairman of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“While the Affordable Care Act still allows government-subsidized plans to cover abortion, at least with this rule, Americans can now see and try to avoid complicity by choosing plans consistent with their consciences,” he said Dec. 23.

“I commend the administration for enforcing the law, for its efforts to ensure transparency in healthcare, and for attempting to respect unborn human life.”

Section 1303 of the Affordable Care Act, passed in 2010, mandates that if a qualified health plan covers elective abortions, it must do so by collecting a payment separate from the standard premium, and depositing that payment into a separate account. The previous regulations allowed for health insurers to collect an abortion surcharge without separately identifying it on monthly invoices and without collecting it separately.

That changed on Dec. 20, when the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services issued the Exchange Program Integrity final rule.

One of its new provisions concerns health insurance exchange plans set up under the Affordable Care Act and covering elective abortions—procedures which under federal law cannot be funded with federal funds.

These plans must now send customers separate health insurance bills for abortion coverage. The agency justified the rule on the grounds that it better aligns with congressional intent in segregating payments for elective abortion.

The rule appears to allow consumers to avoid payment on the surcharge without losing coverage. The fact sheet for the rule states “if the policy holder fails to pay the separate bill in a separate transaction as instructed by the issuer, the issuer may not terminate the policy holder’s coverage on this basis, provided the amount due is otherwise paid.”

Critics have long argued that enforcement of these regulations under the Obama administration was so permissive as to render the rules meaningless. A Government Accountability Office report in 2014 found that many insurers were ignoring requirements to segregate abortion coverage funds.

The Trump administration rule had been proposed about a year ago, but it had not been finalized and implemented.

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, said the rule “will ensure compliance so that ‘separate’ no longer means ‘together’ when it comes to funding abortion.” The law will “provide transparency about abortion funding hiding in Obamacare,” she said, referring to the 2010 health care legislation.

“President Trump has delivered an important victory for American consumers and taxpayers, the majority of whom oppose using tax dollars to pay for abortions.”

Jacqueline Ayers, vice president of government relations and public policy at Planned Parenthood, opposed the rule on the grounds it tried to reduce access to abortion.

“This rule won’t just require separate payments, it further splits off abortion from other reproductive health care and puts up massive barriers to access,” she said.

Ayers added that Planned Parenthood, which is the largest abortion provider in the U.S., “vehemently opposes this rule and will continue our work to stop the administration’s attacks on our health and rights.”

The Association for Community Affiliated Plans, which has 60 Medicaid-focused health care plans, also opposed the rule, CNN reports.

“Requiring people to pay two bills for one product — health coverage — is a non-solution in search of a problem,” said Margaret Murray, the association’s CEO.

Critics of the previous rule have sought change under the Trump administration. In 2018 U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), in a letter to the Department of Health and Human services signed by 102 Members of Congress, requested regulations to make consumers aware of the surcharge.

In October 2019, more than 40 pro-life organizations sent a letter to the Trump administration backing the new changes. Signers included leaders with the Susan B. Anthony List, the National Right to Life Committee, March for Life Action, Americans United for Life, and the American Association of Pro-Life OB-GYNS.

They said that insurance companies could create “hidden abortion surcharges” which mean health plan enrollees are “unknowingly paying into plans that subsidize elective abortion.”

Their letter cited the Hyde Amendment, first passed in 1976, which bars federal funding for most abortions. They objected that the treatment of abortion coverage violates the amendment in principle. Requiring separate payments would help provide transparency.

While the Hyde Amendment applies to federal health care programs including Medicaid, pro-life advocates have voiced concern for years that the Affordable Care Act does not follow its requirements.

Federal rules against taxpayer funding for abortions have had longtime support even among pro-abortion rights politicians, but the Democratic primary candidates for president have increasingly rejected them. Following criticism from pro-abortion rights activists, former vice president Joe Biden retracted his support for the Hyde Amendment in June.

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Detroit, Mich., Mar 8, 2018 / 05:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A lawsuit threatening a Catholic adoption service is political maneuvering that will do nothing to help children in need of loving homes, families and supporters told a federal court in Michigan during oral arguments this week.

In their latest dispute against a religious entity, Dumont v. Lyon, the ACLU sued in September in order to prevent Michigan from working with faith-based adoption agencies that hold traditional views about marriage, including St. Vincent Catholic Charities.

A 2015 law, which was passed with the backing of the Michigan Catholic Conference, prevents state-funded adoption and foster agencies from being forced to place children in violation of their beliefs. The law protects them from civil action and from threats to their public funding. When the law was passed, about 25 percent of Michigan’s adoption and foster agencies were faith-based.

Shamber Flore, a young woman who was adopted through the foster care program at St. Vincent’s, said that children in foster care need more access to families with loving homes, and that the ACLU’s lawsuit endangers that access.

“I grew up exposed to prostitution, poverty and drugs, but thankfully and fortunately my story didn’t end there,” Flore said in a statement. “I have had the privilege of having my story rewritten and I know this wouldn’t have been possible without the help and aid of St. Vincent.”

The government cannot find foster homes for every child in need, Flore added, and therefore must rely on private agencies like St. Vincent’s to fill in the gaps.

“I am both hurt and confused as to why the ACLU would want to shut down an organization like St. Vincent that only brings good to the greater community,” she said.

“(Foster children) deserve more people, more agencies, more open hearts to fill the shortage of families willing to care for kids like myself. If the ACLU has its way, there will be less helping hands, less homes and ultimately less hope for foster kids, and we can’t let the ACLU take that away.”

The ACLU’s new lawsuit will do nothing to actually help the increasing number of foster children in need of safe and loving homes, said Melissa Buck, a mother who adopted five special needs children with St. Vincent’s.

“This is a petty, needless lawsuit that prioritizes scoring cheap political points at the expense of children,” Buck said in a statement.

“St. Vincent didn’t just save the lives of our children, they’ve accompanied us in the joy of giving them new ones,” Buck noted.

“This is important work. It is also very difficult work. If the ACLU wins their lawsuit, all of this will be taken away…and it would hurt many other families just like mine,” she said.

According to data compiled by Child Trends, more than 600 foster children age out of the foster care system each year in Michigan without ever having been adopted. Studies show that children who age out of foster care without a family are less likely to graduate high school, attend college, or find employment than those who are adopted.

Despite the shortage of available foster families, St. Vincent Catholic Charities found more new foster families than almost 90 percent of other agencies within its service district, according to Becket, the law firm representing the agency.

“St. Vincent particularly excels at finding homes for hard to place children like kids with special needs, larger sibling groups, or older children,” Stephanie Barclay, legal counsel with Becket, said in a statement.

“Despite this heroic and important work, the ACLU sued the state of Michigan to forbid the state from relying on adoption agencies like St. Vincent solely because of its religious beliefs about marriage. But St. Vincent’s beliefs have never prevented a child from being placed in a home,” Barclay said.

This case is not the first time that Catholic Charities has come under fire for reserving adoptions to a mother and a father. In 2006, Catholic Charities of Boston was forced to shut down its adoption services because of a state law barring “sexual orientation discrimination.”

The same year, Catholic Charities of San Francisco was forced to close for similar reasons.

In 2010, after a law redefining marriage, the Washington, D.C. branch of Catholic Charities was forced to close its foster care and adoption services for holding the belief that children should be placed with a married mother and father.

In 2011, Catholic Charities affiliates in Illinois were forced to close after a new requirement stipulated that state money could only go to adoption services that offered those services to same-sex couples.

In the past, gay couples working with other agencies have been able to adopt foster children that were in the care of St. Vincent’s in Michigan, and the ACLU’s clients in Dumont v. Lyon could have done the same, Barclay noted. The clients also live closer to four different adoption agencies other than St. Vincent’s.

“Instead…the ACLU has gone out of its way to target St. Vincent and to try to shut down their programs,” Barclay said.

“Based on today’s hearing, we’re hopeful that the court will listen to the stories of the foster families and children before it who will bear the brunt of the ACLU’s petty lawsuit.”

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