ADF to Supreme Court: Biden-Harris Title X rule change violates federal conscience protections

The following quote may be attributed to Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel and Vice President of Appellate Advocacy John Bursch regarding a friend-of-the-court brief ADF filed Monday with the U.S. Supreme Court in State of Oklahoma v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on behalf of five medical associations and pro-life groups. The case involves a Biden-Harris administration rule change that requires recipients of federal Title X family-planning funds to counsel and refer women for abortions, even though multiple federal laws protect health care providers from being forced to participate in abortion if it violates their conscience and religious beliefs:

“Doctors and nurses shouldn’t be forced to violate their consciences and their religious beliefs as the price of practicing medicine—especially when those are the very beliefs that lead so many people to enter the healing profession. Health care professionals’ oath to ‘do no harm’ directly conflicts with abortion, which ends the life of the unborn child and harms the child’s mother. The Biden-Harris administration’s Title X rule punishes pro-life states like Oklahoma that have laws in place that protect the life of the mother and child and refuse to force medical professionals who object to facilitating abortion. We are urging the Supreme Court to take this case and require the federal government to restore Oklahoma’s critical Title X funding without unlawfully mandating that health care professionals violate their life-affirming beliefs.”

ADF attorneys filed the brief on behalf of the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the Christian Medical and Dental Associations, the Catholic Medical Association, the National Association of Catholic Nurses, and the Human Coalition.

Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.

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