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These are the six US states with one remaining abortion clinic

August 13, 2019 CNA Daily News 0

Washington D.C., Aug 13, 2019 / 05:15 pm (CNA).- Amid efforts in many states to pass pro-life legislation and challenge the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision, six states— Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, and West Virginia— have reached the point of having just one abortion clinic remaining active.

Despite this, federal judges have blocked several states’ most recent efforts to restrict abortion, a number of which were set to go into effect this summer.

Judge Carlton W. Reeves of the Federal District Court in Jackson, Mississippi on May 24 temporarily blocked a Mississippi law that prohibited abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, which would have effectively banned abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy. The law was set to go into effect July 1.

Mississippi still has just one abortion clinic remaining— Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

North Dakota’s governor signed into law in April a bill that outlaws the common abortion procedure known as “dilation and evacuation,” also known as “dismemberment abortion,” but the law is not currently being enforced sue to legal challenges.

The state also passed a law requiring physicians to tell women that they may reverse a medication abortion, a requirement which is also facing legal challenges. The state’s lone abortion clinic, Red River Women’s Clinic, is suing to block the new laws.

In Missouri, an eight-week abortion ban, which Gov. Mike Parson signed in May and was set to take effect Aug. 28, is being challenged in court.

The state’s lone abortion clinic, a Planned Parenthood located in St. Louis, failed to meet the state requirements for relicensing, but the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services is allowing the clinic to continue performing abortions until Oct. 28, when the next hearing to determine the clinic’s final status is scheduled.

Federal Judge David J. Hale of the Western District of Kentucky in March blocked a law that would prohibit abortion after the detection of a fetal heartbeat in Kentucky. EMW Women’s Surgical Center in Louisville is the last abortion clinic in that state.

Other states’ attempts to pass “heartbeat bills” that ban abortion following the detection of a fetal heartbeat have run into similar judicial hurdles. Due to the existing legal precedent of the Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, which found that a woman has a constitutional right to an abortion, legislation that restricts abortion prior to fetal viability is generally found to be unconstitutional.

Women’s Health Center of West Virginia in Charleston is that state’s last clinic. South Dakota’s last clinic is Planned Parenthood in Sioux Falls.

District Court Judge Kristine Baker of the Eastern District of Arkansas 6 blocked new abortion regulations Aug. 6 in that state while legal challenges play out in court, saying that women would “suffer irreparable harm” if the laws were to be enforced.

The laws in question would ban abortions in Arkansas after 18 weeks of pregnancy, except in cases of rape, incest, and medical emergency. They would require doctors who perform abortions to be board-certified or eligible in obstetrics and gynecology, and they would prohibit abortions based solely on a Down syndrome diagnosis for the baby,

Arkansas’ laws had been set to go into effect July 24. In the meantime, the state only has one surgical abortion clinic— Little Rock Family Planning Services— but Planned Parenthood Little Rock still performs medical abortions.

[…]

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News Briefs

Gomez: ‘White America’ is a myth

August 13, 2019 CNA Daily News 4

Los Angeles, Calif., Aug 13, 2019 / 05:00 pm (CNA).- The Archbishop of Los Angeles wrote this week that the white nationalism which motivated a mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, is a sign that the U.S. has lost touch with the Christian ideals of the nat… […]

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New green card rule ‘undermines family unity’ bishops say

August 13, 2019 CNA Daily News 2

Washington D.C., Aug 13, 2019 / 03:01 pm (CNA).- The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has voiced opposition to a new “public charge” policy that could deny visas and green cards to immigrants who use, or are deemed likely to use, various public welfare programs such as food stamps, Medicaid, or housing assistance. 

The rule was announced on August 12 and is expected to be formalized on Wednesday when it is published in the Federal Register.

“Ultimately, we believe that this rule is in tension with the dignity of the person and the common good that all of us are called to support,”  said Bishops Joe S. Vasquez of Austin and Frank J. Dewane of Venice (FL) in a statement released by the USCCB website Tuesday. 

Vasquez is the chair of the USCCB Committee on Migration, and Dewane leads the USCCB Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development. 

The rule is set to go into effect on October 15, and will not penalize immigrants applying for green cards or visas public benefit previously used. The penalties will only be applied to people who used public assistance after that date. 

Ken Cuccinelli, the acting director of  U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, explained Monday that anyone who applying for either legal status or a green card must show that they will not be a “public charge.”

“Our rule generally prevents aliens who are likely to become a public charge from coming to the United States or remaining here in getting a green card,” said Cuccinelli on Monday during a briefing. 

“‘Public charge’ is now defined in a way that ensures the law is meaningfully enforced. Those who are subject to it are self-sufficient under the rule of public charge is now defined as an individual who receives one or more designated public benefits for more than 12 months,” he said.

In an appearance on NPR’s Morning Edition on Tuesday, Cuccinelli went further in his defence of the new rule, paraphrasing the famous inscription at the base of the Statue of Liberty. 

“Give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge,” he said, while insisting that “no one has a right to become an American who isn’t born here.”

In their own statement, the bishops said that the new rule would mean families in difficulty could not get the help they need. 

“This rule will undermine family unity and lead many lawful immigrants to forgo vital assistance, including enrollment in nutrition, housing, and medical programs,” said the bishops. 

“Families already in the U.S. will be faced with deciding whether to access critical assistance programs for which they qualify, knowing that in doing so they could jeopardize their ability to stay here with their loved ones. And, it will reduce the ability of many to reunify with family in the U.S.,” they added.

The bishops warned that the anticipation of this rule change has already created a “culture of fear” in immigrant communities.

Cucinelli defended the policy as “the same sort of requirements that we’ve had in the past, for well over a century,” and said “What we’re looking for here are people who are going to live with us either their whole lives or, ultimately, become citizens, who can stand on their own two feet.”

Programs such as disaster relief, food pantries, and homeless shelters, or programs that are for  the benefit of children, such as school lunch programs, WIC, CHIP, or Medicaid received by people under the age of 21 or by pregnant women, will not count against someone’s green card or visa application. 

Additionally, an applicant’s English skills and health will also be considered during an application for permanent residency or legal status. 

Cuccinelli denied that the regulation was aimed at one ethnic group in particular, saying “If we had been having this conversation a hundred years ago, it would have applied to more Italians.”

[…]

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News Briefs

Tennessee legislators discuss abortion bill in hopes of overturning Roe v Wade

August 13, 2019 CNA Daily News 0

Nashville, Tenn., Aug 13, 2019 / 01:57 pm (CNA).- The Tennessee Senate judiciary committee held a second day of hearings Tuesday in a ‘summer study’ session of a bill regulating abortion.

In its current form, the bill would define an unborn child’s viability as starting from conception. Legislators who support the proposal hope it would find sympathetic ears at the US Supreme Court.

House Bill 77 (Senate Bill 1236) was passed by the state House in March, but the Senate judiciary committee voted 5-3, with one abstention, on April 9 to defer it to “summer study.”

SB1236 would have banned abortion from the detection of a fetal heartbeat, usually around six weeks of pregnancy. It was opposed by the state’s bishops, and Tennessee Right to Life, over concerns it would not stand up to judicial scrutiny.

In choosing to send the bill to summer study, the committee chairman, Sen. Mike Bell said it had “the best of intentions,” The Tennesseean reported.

“But to be successful in the fight to protect the unborn, strong conviction is not enough. We must also have the proper legal and constitutional strategy. I can assure you the left will use every legal means at their disposal to ensure abortion remains legal, unrestricted and readily available. We must do likewise to prevent it.”

Bell told the bill’s sponsor, “I can assure you your bill is not dead.”

Sen. Mark Pody, its sponsor, has amended SB1236 effectively to declare viability as beginning from conception: “A pregnancy is presumed to exist and to be viable upon finding the presence of human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) using a test that is consistent with standard medical practice.” Some court rulings, such as Planned Parenthood v. Casey, have linked governments’ ability to regulate abortion with the viability of the child.

The summer study was held Aug. 12-13, and attracted hundreds of spectators on both sides of the problem. The committee is hearing testimony from both pro-life and pro-choice advocates.

Bell suggested during the study Aug. 12 that the committee believes the viability definition “acts as an argument that would resonate with the (Supreme) Court,” according to The Tennesseean, and some pro-life advocates suggested the Ninth Amendment’s unenumerated rights as a route for overturning Roe v. Wade.

“We want a vehicle to lead the Supreme Court to consider, I hope, overturning or at least chipping away at Roe v. Wade,” Sen. Kerry Roberts told CBS News.

But Jim Bopp, an attorney with the National Right to Life Comittee, told the legislators that “To enact legislation we have to live in the real world. We have precedent we cannot avoid with a clever legal argument.”

He called the proposed definition of viability “irrational,” adding: “It makes us look foolish. And I do not want to look foolish.”

During the study Aug. 13, Bell made a point of telling a mother attending the hearing that she needn’t take her crying child out, saying that children are welcome in Tennessee.

During the summer study, the committee did not vote on the bill; the measure will not be voted on until the state legislature reconvenes in January 2020.

Earlier in the year, when HB77 remained a ‘heartbeat bill’, Gov. Bill Lee indicated he would sign it should it reach his desk. His deputy, Lt. Gov. Randy McNally, had criticized the bill on the grounds that it would be overturned in the courts.

Though the Tennessee bishops and other pro-life groups opposed the bill, they voiced support for another bill, the Human Life Protection Act, that would automatically ban abortion in the state in the event that Roe were overturned.

Tennessee currently prohibits abortion after the 20th week of pregnancy, and requires a woman to wait 48 hours before receiving an abortion.

In 2014, voters in the state approved an amendment to the state constitution that said, “Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or the funding of an abortion.”

[…]

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Bishops call for support for HHS rule change

August 13, 2019 CNA Daily News 0

Washington D.C., Aug 13, 2019 / 09:30 am (CNA).- Public consultation closes Tuesday on a new rule to protect doctors’ and healthcare workers’ right to object to abortion and so-called gender reassignment procedures.

August 13 is the last day on which the Department of Health and Human Services will receive feedback on the proposed change to the interpretation of section 1557 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Working with the USCCB’s pro-life committee, the bishops’ conference has created a special website to help Catholics contact the department and express support for the regulatory change.

The Catholic Benefits Association, which advocates for religious liberty protections in insurance regulations, urged its supporters last week to respond to the bishops’ initiative.

The change recognizes that “the government’s enforcement of the nondiscrimination requirements must be consistent with the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act,” the organization’s CEO, Douglas Wilson, said in an email Aug. 8.

Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act forbids federally funded healthcare programs from discrimination on the basis of sex. Under the current guidelines, issued under President Obama in May 2016, “sex” is defined as including “termination of pregnancy” and “gender identity,” meaning that doctors who refuse to recognize abortion or sex-change operations as appropriate medical care can face prosecution for sex discrimination.

In May, the Trump administration announced it was considering changing regulations related to section 1557, removing the expansive definition of “sex,” clarifying that section 1557 cannot be used to compel doctors to perform abortions or sex-change operations, and requiring that non-discrimination protections be interpreted in line with First Amendment freedoms.  

At the time of the announcement, the USCCB pro-life committee, led by Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, issued a statement “applauding” the proposed changes and saying the bishops were “grateful” the administration was taking the “important step.”

“These modifications follow the legislative intent of the Affordable Care Act to ensure nondiscrimination on the basis of sex in health care,” the statement said.

“The proposed regulations would help restore the rights of health care providers – as well as insurers and employers – who decline to perform or cover abortions or ‘gender transition’ procedures due to ethical or professional objections. Catholic health care providers serve everyone who comes to them, regardless of characteristics or background. However, there are ethical considerations when it comes to procedures.”

Eight states and multiple healthcare providers challenged the Obama-era regulations in federal district court in the case Franciscan Alliance v Burwell, filed in December 2016. That case resulted in Judge Reed O’Connor issuing a nationwide preliminary injunction against the enforcement of the regulations, finding that the expanded definition of sex discrimination likely encroached on religious freedom. The federal government did not appeal the injunction.

The USCCB’s Office of the General Counsel submitted its own comments August 1, calling the current interpretation of section 1557 “erroneous” and arguing that it violated key civil liberty protections, including the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

“Commendably—and appropriately, given the nationwide injunction and the government’s confession of error—the proposed regulations correct this earlier misinterpretation,” the general counsel wrote on behalf of the bishops.

The proposed new rule is open for public comment until midnight Tuesday.

[…]

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Future of Michigan pro-life program in jeopardy as funding threatened

August 13, 2019 CNA Daily News 3

Lansing, Mich., Aug 13, 2019 / 03:28 am (CNA).- Lawmakers in Michigan are considering ending public funding for a program that counsels pregnant women on alternatives to abortion, prompting concern from the Michigan Catholic Conference, which has been advocating for the program since its inception five years ago.

The program, administered by a nonprofit called Real Alternatives, began in Pennsylvania in 1996 and has since helped thousands of women, across several states, facing unplanned pregnancies by providing counseling and material resources such as baby formula and other necessities. The program expanded its operations to Michigan beginning in June 2014 with the backing of the Michigan Catholic Conference (MCC).

Two Democratic Michigan state senators introduced amendments to the state budget this year to block funding for Real Alternatives, which failed to pass. The funding for the program— $700,000 in total— is still included in the legislature’s budget for 2020.

Despite this, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, the state’s new governor who took office in Jan. 2019, has so far not included funding for Real Alternatives in her most recent budget, according to a July 22 editorial in The Detroit News.

David Maluchnik, communications vice president for the MCC, told CNA that the MCC is continuing to advocate for funding for the program to be included in the state budget.

“We’ve already succeeded in beating back efforts to line-item the funds from committee and on the Senate floor,” Maluchnik told CNA via email.

“As out-of-state, pro-abortion organizations have spent at least six figures to defund the program, MCC continues to speak with administration officials and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle as budget discussions continue.”

According to Real Alternatives’ estimates, the Michigan program has served 8,240 women at 31,958 support visits since 2014. The state has appropriated $3.3 million to the program since its inception.

“Citizens want to help these women. This is the fastest way to lower abortions,” Real Alternatives founding CEO Kevin Bagatta told CNA.

“Citizens are happy that their taxpayer monies are being used to help their fellow citizens in an unexpected pregnancy.”

If a woman is alone and poor, she may struggle with the pressures of an unexpected pregnancy, he said. What the Real Alternatives program does is provide a counselor, who helps the woman from conception until 12 months after the baby’s birth, training her how to take care of the baby and herself.

The counselor acts as a mentor— like a big sister, he said, or maybe even the mother they never had— to help to relieve some of the stress and pressures of pregnancy. He noted that it is primarily a counseling program, not a medical program, although the program offers referrals for medical needs, and saves the state of Michigan money that it might have otherwise spent on additional medical care for pregnant women.

All together, he said, the program has served close to 400,000 women across all the states where it operates since its founding 24 years ago. Over the years, he said, numerous clients come back having finished a nursing degree to volunteer at the very center that helped them.

In Michigan, Real Alternatives uses a network of 15 pregnancy support centers, as well as several Catholic Charities affiliates, to provide its services to women.

According to the Michigan state health department, Real Alternatives is receiving $700,000 in funding for FY 2019, with $650,000 of that coming from federal grants and $50,000 from the state general fund.

Pennsylvania and beyond

Bagatta was one of the original founders of Real Alternatives, which was founded and is still headquartered in Pennsylvania. He said the Pennsylvania program alone has served over 308,000 women since its inception, and has inspired pro-life groups in other states to start similar programs. He said they’ve helped about 14 states so far to start similar programs whereby the state helps to fund the pregnancy support network.

“We’re really no different from domestic violence and rape crisis programs,” he explained.

“In those programs you have a certain client, a woman who’s vulnerable…and what this program is it’s, again, another vulnerable client, the woman who’s in an unexpected pregnancy.”

Bagatta noted that research done in the 1980s found that about 80% of women who had procured an abortion who were surveyed said that they would not have gone through with the procedure if just one person had taken the time to help them.

In 1996, then-Pennsylvania Governor Bob Casey put funding in the state budget for alternatives to abortion services. Bagatta said this was the first time that a state used government funding for pregnancy centers and Catholic Charities to promote childbirth as an alternative to abortion for women facing unintended pregnancies.

Today, Real Alternatives runs the Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Michigan programs from their base in Harrisburg. They helped to start a similar program in Texas.

In 2013, Real Alternatives was asked by the Michigan Catholic Conference to help to explain the program to then-Governor Rick Snyder, who put money in the budget to start the state’s program.

Catholic Charities affiliates in the various states are staffed with licensed social workers and trained counselors.

Under the George W. Bush administration, the program was accepted as meeting the requirements to use Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) money from the federal government, which states may use as they see fit. This means many of the state programs are funded with federal dollars; Pennsylvania’s program, like Michigan’s, also is funded by some state revenue. Usually the program is accepted in a state with a pro-life governor, Bagatta said.

“Every state gets TANF money. So if you’re a pro-life governor, you can have this program and use your TANF money to do a program like we have in the multiple states that we administer.”

In Michigan, half the clients are served through Catholic Charities affiliates in Kalamazoo, Southeast Michigan, West Michigan, and Washtenaw, in addition to three pregnancy centers.

Catholic Charities affiliates are able to dedicate staff specifically for this program as a result of the funding received, Bagatta said, and the funding model provides an incentive for the centers to serve more clients and open specific pregnancy resource programs.

Attempts to defund Real Alternatives

The program is not without its critics, however. Early in 2019, a group called the Campaign for Accountability filed a complaint with the governor and attorney general stating that after pledging to administer 8,000 visits and serve 2,000 people in Michigan in Real Alternatives’ first year of operation, the program “only managed to oversee a mere 785 visits and serve only 403 women.”

The Campaign for Accountability also stated that the abortion rate in Michigan had remained “about the same” during the time that Real Alternatives had been active in the state.

The Campaign for Accountability is run by the Hopewell Fund, a nonprofit whose executive director and project director formerly worked for the pro-abortion Center for Reproductive Rights and Planned Parenthood.

“You wouldn’t think the work to help women, so that she doesn’t have to choose an abortion, would be controversial. But it is,” Bagatta said.

“We’re surprised that in 2019 there are groups that don’t want us to be funded, there are groups that don’t want the program to succeed.”

Previously, in September 2017, Pennsylvania’s auditor general recommended ending the state’s contract with Real Alternatives because, in his estimation, the organization had used Pennsylvania state money to expand its operations in other states, in violation of the group’s agreement with the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services.

Real Alternatives responded in a statement at the time, saying that the Program Development and Advancement Agreement is a second, voluntary contract whereby service providers “hire Real Alternatives to grow its model Pregnancy and Parenting Support Program.”

Real Alternatives said that while service providers are fully reimbursed for their services, many of them voluntarily agreed to provide 3% back to Real Alternatives— which then became private funds— in order to help to spread the program to other states. This allowed Real Alternatives to, in their words, “scrupulously” comply with the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services requirements that Pennsylvania state dollars not be used in other states.

Real Alternatives said this process had been audited four times in the past with no issues, and ultimately successfully sued the state of Pennsylvania, claiming the auditor general was overreaching his authority by seeking to audit Real Alternative’s use of those private funds.

Future uncertain

Maluchnik of the Michigan Catholic Conference reiterated that Real Alternatives provides needed care for women who would otherwise choose abortion.

“[The program] not only provides support and care, it provides formula and [referrals for] pre- and post-natal meds; it gets clothing and shelter to mom and baby where there may otherwise be none; it helps with parenting tips when there’s no one to talk to; it offsets threats to infant mortality and gives young children and mothers a healthy start and a brighter future.”

“In the end, pulling the rug from under low-income women and her unborn or infant child at a time when they’re most vulnerable would constitute a heartless, calculated political maneuver. We’re praying it does not happen.”

[…]

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Mississippi bishops encourage aid for families affected by ICE raids

August 12, 2019 CNA Daily News 0

Jackson, Miss., Aug 12, 2019 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- Mississippi’s Catholic bishops are speaking out against last week’s extensive Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids that targeted workers at food processing plants, rounding up and detaining nearly 700 undocumented immigrants.

Nearly 400 of those detained — some of whom left children behind on the first day of the new school year— have not yet been released.

“We can stand in solidarity to provide solace, material assistance and strength for the separated and traumatized children, parents and families. Of course, we are committed to a just and compassionate reform to our nation’s immigration system, but there is an urgent and critical need at this time to avoid a worsening crisis,” Bishops Joseph Kopacz of Jackson and Louis Kihneman of Biloxi said in an Aug. 9 joint statement together with representatives of the state’s Episcopal, Methodist, and Evangelical Lutheran Church of America communities.

ICE agents carried out raids on seven sites in Mississippi Aug. 7, rounding up as many as 700 undocumented workers. Officials have announced that around 300 of those detained have been released on humanitarian grounds, many of them parents who are now reunited with their children, CNN reports.

Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Jackson is asking for donations— both monetary and also items such as diapers, baby formula, household and school supplies, and hygiene kits— to help families affected by the raids.

“To say that immigration reform is a contentious and complex topic would be an understatement. As Christians, within any disagreement we should all be held together by our baptismal promises. Our baptism, regardless of denomination calls us to unity in Jesus Christ. We are his body and, therefore, called to act in love as a unified community for our churches and for the common good of our local communities and nation,” the Christian leaders said in their joint statement.

They echoed USCCB president Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, who wrote a letter to President Trump last month saying that ICE raids “cause the unacceptable suffering of thousands of children and their parents, and create widespread panic in our communities.”

“We can stand in solidarity to provide solace, material assistance and strength for the separated and traumatized children, parents and families. Of course, we are committed to a just and compassionate reform to our nation’s immigration system, but there is an urgent and critical need at this time to avoid a worsening crisis,” the Christian leaders said.

CNN spoke to Father Odel Medina at St. Anne Catholic Church in Carthage, about 50 miles northeast of Jackson, who said around 50 members of his congregation were detained in the raids. He called the raids a “disaster” for his parish, CNN reports.

[…]