The Republican-majority House of Representatives recently passed the comically named One Big Beautiful Bill Act on May 22. This piece of legislation includes a catalogue of conservative favorites such as phasing out former President Joe Biden’s clean energy tax credits, adding funding for mass deportations and imposing work requirements for access to food assistance and Medicaid. Nestled between these nuggets of gutting the social safety net, there is also a provision which, in effect, would defund Planned Parenthood. 

Section 44126 of the bill prohibits Medicaid reimbursements for healthcare providers who perform abortion services. If passed in the Senate, this would be a major blow to organizations like Planned Parenthood, which rely on Medicaid reimbursements to service underprivileged communities. Allowing this funding is crucial for the reproductive healthcare of low-income individuals, and the downstream socioeconomic consequences will be costly for all of us.

Most of the supporters of this provision praise gutting funding because Planned Parenthood provides abortion services. The argument goes that federal funding should not be directed towards abortion providers, hence why the bill is supported by organizations like Americans United For Life, an anti-abortion law firm. 

Ripping away healthcare for millions of people under the guise of caring about life notwithstanding, the kicker is that federal funding already cannot be used for abortions — unless under limited exceptions — due to the Hyde Amendment passed in 1976. Unilaterally cutting off Medicaid funding because of abortions is accordingly politically redundant and actively harmful to those who use the multitudes of other non-abortive services that organizations like Planned Parenthood provide. 

For example, in addition to abortions, Planned Parenthood affiliates provide birth control, STI testing, pregnancy testing and planning, vaccinations, HIV services, and mental health treatments, among many other kinds of necessary healthcare. 

Given that this bill is targeting Medicaid — which helps cover medical costs for those with limited means — its implementation would hit low-income people the most. 

According to KFF Health Tracking Poll data from May, “Over four in ten individuals with Medicaid say they have received services at Planned Parenthood.” Moreover, abortion accounts for only 3% of Planned Parenthood’s care. As KFF highlights, this means “the majority of medicaid beneficiaries who received family planning services at a Planned Parenthood clinic received contraceptive and STI services,” not abortions. 

Removing this reproductive safety net where people can receive birth control or family planning services leaves, as estimated by the Congressional Budget Office, 13.7 million people without health care coverage by 2034.

The downstream impacts of defunding Planned Parenthood will impact people all throughout the U.S. 

Defunding it could lead to the shuttering of over a hundred health centers across the country. Planned Parenthood services more than 2 million patients every year, with 64% of its centers located in rural and medically underserved areas and just over half of its patients getting care through publicly funded programs like Medicaid or Title X. Additionally, two out of three patients reported that publicly funded health centers, such as Planned Parenthood, were their primary source of healthcare. 

Economically, preventative healthcare, which Planned Parenthood provides, also saves billions of taxpayer dollars per year. 

Researchers at the Brookings Institute, Emily Monea and Adam Thomas, estimated in 2011 that “public savings from preventing these unintended pregnancies would range from $4.7 billion to $6.2 billion, and average $5.6 billion” per year. The Guttmacher Institute found that “the total public cost of unintended pregnancy in 2006 was $11.1 billion” per year and also estimated that for every federal dollar spent on contraception, the government saves $5 on pregnancy treatment.

These attacks on reproductive freedom and access to affordable healthcare are not exclusive to a Republican-controlled government. 

Albeit perhaps less ideologically driven, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s new Medi-Cal budget shifts $1.6 billion allocated by Proposition 35 — a ballot measure which earmarked more than $2 billion of tax revenue for Medi-Cal — to help tamp down California’s deficit. In addition to Prop 35 changes, Newsom also seeks to shift $500 million from the state’s tobacco tax, some of which is allotted for family planning and reproductive health services, to the general state budget. 

In doing so, Newsom is copying the Republican defunding playbook while touting being a champion of reproductive rights. If California wants to maintain its reputation as a beacon of reproductive freedom, we cannot cripple Planned Parenthood’s ability to provide healthcare.

Contact your state and federal representatives and express your opposition to the budget reconciliation bill and Newsom’s budget reallocation, especially its provisions that strip necessary funding from health care organizations like Planned Parenthood.