ACLU Statement on Supreme Court Ruling in June Medical Services v. Russo

Harrisburg, Penn.— The National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association (NFPRHA) and its member, the Family Health Council of Central Pennsylvania (FHCCP), today sued the Trump administration to protect the integrity of the Title X family planning program. Title X is the country’s only dedicated federal program for family planning services. For more than 55 years, the program has provided access to effective contraceptive methods, cancer screenings, testing and treatment for STIs, and other preventive services, with priority given to patients with low incomes. In April, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a Title X Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for fiscal year (FY) 2027 designed to corrupt a merit-based grant competition based on politics, prioritizing ideology over quality and qualifications. The Title X NOFO is written to enable the federal government to push highly qualified Title X providers out of the program and bring in new grantees based solely on their alignment with the Trump administration’s political priorities, some of which have nothing to do with the Title X program, the services Congress intended for it to provide, or the patients it is intended to serve. “NFPRHA is suing the federal government to stop its latest hostile action to destabilize Title X, the nation’s family planning program,” said Clare Coleman, NFPRHA’s President & CEO. “HHS’s new Title X grant application guidelines violate the current statutory and regulatory requirements of the program. For more than 55 years, the highly effective Title X program has provided expert health care in health centers across the U.S. The current Title X rule prioritizes health equity, anti-discrimination, and client-centered care, which clashes with HHS’s new funding opportunity guidelines that demand applicants demonstrate agreement with the administration’s anti-DEI and anti-“gender ideology” stances. HHS’s guidelines could unfairly exclude highly qualified and trusted family planning providers deeply rooted in the communities they serve from funding consideration. We are asking the federal government to explain the conflict between the law and its application guidance in court.” The lawsuit, filed on behalf of NFPRHA and FHCCP by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the ACLU of Pennsylvania (ACLU-PA), challenges aspects of the FY 2027 NOFO that contradict the Title X statute, regulations, and guidance. For example, the Title X statute requires HHS to consider specific factors when evaluating an applicant for family planning grants, including the number of patients to be served, the extent to which family planning services are needed locally, and the capacity of applicants to make rapid and effective use of the grant funds. But under the FY 2027 NOFO, applicants can be rejected at a threshold stage if they do not sufficiently align with the Trump administration’s political priorities. As a result, their applications would never be considered under the factors Congress intended or be judged on the merits. Furthermore, under the Title X regulations, Title X grantees must serve patients in an inclusive, culturally appropriate, and nondiscriminatory manner. The Title X regulations also require that grantees ensure that transgender people are “fully included and can actively participate in and benefit from family planning.” These requirements are in direct conflict with the NOFO’s mandate to align with the Trump administration’s agenda that opposes diversity, equity, and inclusion, particularly for transgender people. “The Title X family planning funding announcement is an attempt to rig the system against well-qualified providers, and to instead favor new prospective Title X grantees based solely on their political alignment with the Trump administration’s agenda,” said Brigitte Amiri, deputy director of the Reproductive Freedom Project of the ACLU. “Once again, the Trump administration is violating the law to the detriment of everyday people, in this case the millions of people, most who have lower incomes, that obtain critical care from Title X family planning providers, such as contraception, STI testing and treatment, and cervical cancer screenings. We will do everything we can to protect the integrity of the Title X program so that people can get the health care they need.” “FHCCP has led the Title X program in Central Pennsylvania for more than 50 years. In that time, our team has built a strong network of providers and community partners that today serve more than 31,000 people each year, providing high-quality family planning services across a 24-county region,” said Patricia Fonzi, President/CEO of FHCCP. “We welcome a competitive grant process and believe every applicant should be evaluated on its ability to effectively serve communities, responsibly steward federal resources, and demonstrate the experience and capacity necessary to carry out the Title X statute. At the end of the day, the success of Title X is measured by whether people can access the care they need in their own communities – and that depends on funding decisions grounded in experience, proven performance, and the ability to deliver comprehensive care where it is needed most.” "The Trump administration's attempt to condition Title X funding on political allegiance is a grave threat to public health," said Sara Rose, deputy legal director at ACLU of Pennsylvania. "Grant decisions must be guided by objective standards to ensure that taxpayer money is spent fairly and efficiently without regard to the ideology of its recipients." The lawsuit also claims that the federal government acted arbitrarily and capriciously, including by relying on factors outside of what Congress intended for review of Title X grants. Further, the challenged aspects of the NOFO are an unjustified reversal of the federal government's prior positions. This lawsuit, National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association et al. v. Kennedy et al., was filed in the Middle District of Pennsylvania. The complaint is available here.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Today, Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaiʻi, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky (PPGNHAIK) filed a lawsuit challenging Alaska’s unconstitutional ban on telehealth abortion. Alaska law currently bans clinicians from evaluating patients via telehealth so that patients can have a medication abortion at home or another location of their choosing — a safe, effective, and widely used form of care. Patients in Alaska seeking medication abortion are instead forced to travel to be seen in person, a medically unnecessary requirement that delays and denies patients’ access to care. This telehealth ban violates the Alaska Constitution, which protects the fundamental right to abortion. This lawsuit comes as another case filed by PPGNHAIK is pending in front of the Alaska Supreme Court, in which a trial court has allowed advanced practice clinicians to provide abortion, which has expanded the pool of practitioners who can provide abortion care. Telehealth is a proven, modern tool for delivering care, and today more than 1 in 4 people in the U.S. who have an abortion do so using this model. PPGNHAIK operates the only two health centers that publicly provide abortion in Alaska, located in Anchorage and Fairbanks. The state’s telehealth ban forces all Alaskans seeking medication abortion to travel to one of those health centers — despite the state’s massive size and many rural and remote communities — for in-person care, even though doing so is typically not medically necessary. More than 60,000 Alaskans live off the road system and can only travel by plane to reach Anchorage or Fairbanks, and only when weather permits. Many of those who do live on the road system still must drive hundreds of miles round-trip to reach a health center, putting essential health care services out of reach. Beyond transportation concerns and expenses, patients often face lost wages due to missed work and incur childcare costs, further compounding the financial strain and creating significant barriers to timely care. Statement from Rebecca Gibron (she/hers), President and CEO, PPGNHAIK: “Today, on behalf of the patients who need care, we’re challenging Alaska’s unconstitutional telehealth ban. The State Constitution guarantees the right to abortion, and this ban delays and denies that time-sensitive care, forcing patients to travel for in-person appointments, despite it not being medically necessary for most patients. The restriction creates unnecessary barriers that fall hardest on people in rural and remote communities, survivors of violence, and those already facing economic hardship — sometimes barring patients from care entirely. Simply put, this telehealth ban is yet another unnecessary barrier to abortion access, and Alaskans deserve better. “At a time when Alaska faces a critical health care provider shortage, the state should be working to improve access to care by expanding telehealth services, not restrict it. We will never stop fighting to ensure Alaskans can exercise their constitutional right to abortion, no matter what.” A link to the complaint can be found here and the brief seeking a preliminary injunction here. PPGNHAIK is represented by attorneys from Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Alaska, and the law firm Davis Wright Tremaine LLP.

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — The Alabama Supreme Court today declined to review a January 2026 state appellate court decision that allows the Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) to require birth centers to obtain burdensome and unnecessary licenses as “hospitals.” Litigation is ongoing to challenge specific restrictions in the licensing rules. However, by declining to hear this case, the Alabama Supreme Court has opened the door for regulations that could threaten the ability of birth centers to continue operating long-term in the state, despite evidence that these independent facilities safely provide much-needed midwifery care to low-risk pregnant patients in a homelike setting. “Birth centers have been a lifeline for pregnant Alabamians and their families,” said Dr. Yashica Robinson, founder of the Alabama Birth Center. “Birth centers fill a critical gap in access to prenatal, pregnancy, and postpartum care across our state, especially for Black women, people living in rural communities, and people with low incomes. Our birth center was founded to expand access to high-quality midwifery care and help combat our state’s maternal and infant health crisis. We will do everything we can to continue providing this essential care to our communities.” Amid the state’s maternal and infant health crisis — which disproportionately impacts Black women and families, Alabamians with low incomes, rural communities, and others impacted by widespread maternity care deserts — birth centers play a critical role in expanding access to pregnancy-related care. Evidence shows that the midwifery care provided at birth centers is safe and improves patient outcomes, including by reducing preterm births, unnecessary cesarean sections, and health disparities. “By declining to hear this case, the Alabama Supreme Court has rubber-stamped state overreach into pregnant Alabamians’ health care decisions,” said Whitney White, senior staff attorney for the Reproductive Freedom Project of the American Civil Liberties Union. “The Alabama Department of Health’s regulatory scheme for birth centers is misaligned not only with state law, but with clinical evidence. Birth centers provide safe, essential midwifery care to low-risk pregnant Alabamians — and communities need access to them. Despite this setback, we remain committed to fighting for Alabamians and their families to have access to the essential care that they need, and we will continue fighting for birth centers as the case continues.” "While we are disappointed that the Alabama Supreme Court declined to review this case, we remain committed to ensuring that every Alabamian has the opportunity to give birth where and how they choose,” said JaTaune Bosby Gilchrist, executive director of the ACLU of Alabama. “We look forward to making our case that regulations cannot be so restrictive as to essentially ban birth centers in our state." Plaintiff Oasis Family Birthing Center in Birmingham, Alabama’s first freestanding birth center, first opened and began safely providing essential care for pregnant Alabamians in 2022. Additional birth centers, including Plaintiff Alabama Birth Center in Huntsville, have also opened since an Alabama state trial court first blocked the Alabama Department of Public Health’s attempt to restrict access to birth center-provided care at an earlier stage in this case. The lawsuit, Oasis Family Birthing Center et. al. v. Alabama Department of Public Health, was originally filed in the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit Court in Montgomery in August 2023. The plaintiffs – Oasis Family Birthing Center in Birmingham, Heather Skanes, M.D., Alabama Birth Center in Huntsville, Yashica Robinson, M.D., the Alabama affiliate of the American College of Nurse-Midwives, Jo Crawford, CPM, and Tracie Stone, CPM – are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Alabama, Covington & Burling LLP, and Bobby Segall of Copeland Franco.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court today granted an emergency request to block a lower court decision imposing a nationwide prohibition on mail and pharmacy access to mifepristone, a safe and effective medication used in nearly two-thirds of U.S. abortions as well as for early miscarriage care. The Court’s order in Louisiana v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) maintains the status quo that has been in place for more than five years while the litigation returns to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals for the normal appeals process. The Louisiana case is very similar to an earlier lawsuit by abortion opponents, in which the Supreme Court unanimously found in 2024 that the plaintiffs did not have legal standing. The Court’s order preserves the status quo and denies, for now, Louisiana’s effort to force patients to obtain their mifepristone in person at a hospital, clinic, or medical office rather than filling their prescription by mail or at a local pharmacy after receiving care through telemedicine. Notably, the Trump administration did not join the mifepristone manufacturers in asking the Supreme Court to step in, and in the lower courts criticized FDA’s evidence-based decision to lift the in-person dispensing requirement, a decision which every leading medical association endorses. “While it is good news that, for now, patients can continue to get this safe medication by mail and at pharmacies as they have for more than five years, we all know abortion opponents are continuing their unpopular and baseless attacks,” said Julia Kaye, senior staff attorney with the ACLU's Reproductive Freedom Project. “And let’s be clear about the Trump administration’s role here: when nationwide access to a critical abortion and miscarriage medication was on the line, the Trump administration refused to defend the FDA’s action and threw patients under the bus. The American people have made clear time and again that they oppose political efforts to interfere with their ability to make their own health care decisions — and the ACLU will keep fighting with them every step of the way.” Today, more than 1 in 4 people in the U.S. who have an abortion do so using telemedicine and mail or pharmacy dispensing. Without this method of care delivery, patients using mifepristone would be forced to travel, sometimes hundreds of miles, to a health center just to pick up a pill, a requirement that leading medical authorities agree has no safety benefit. A range of experts submitted amicus briefs in the Supreme Court opposing this nationwide restriction as medically unjustified and harmful. FDA lifted the in-person dispensing requirement in 2021 — but anti-abortion politicians have sought to reinstate this and other restrictions through the federal courts. At the same time, the Trump administration is moving forward with a sham FDA review that is itself a thinly veiled attempt to lay the groundwork for additional medically unjustified restrictions on mifepristone.