Philadelphia – The Women’s Law Project applauds Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s announcement today that he is suing President Donald J. Trump and the Trump Administration for issuing new rules that allow virtually any company to deny women insurance coverage for contraception.
According to the lawsuit filed today in the United States District Court in Philadelphia, the rules issued by the Trump Administration on October 6 violate federal law, which requires insurance companies to cover preventive health care services, including contraception, with no co-pay. The administration’s illegal action and new rules mean that 2.5 million Pennsylvania women and their families could have to pay more for basic health care.
“They failed to repeal Obamacare, they failed to defund Planned Parenthood, so now they’re going after contraception,” says Carol E. Tracy, Executive Director of the Women’s Law Project. “The predictable results of this latest way to attack women is unconscionable. Access to contraception reduces maternal and infant mortality, and reducing that access will increase it. Claiming to be “pro-life” and supporting this is beyond hypocritical. It’s outrageous.”
According to the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, it’s illegal, too.
From the complaint:
“This lawsuit challenges the Defendants’ illegal and unjustified attempt to deny millions of women in Pennsylvania and across this country access to necessary preventive health care through their employer-sponsored insurance plans. As set forth more fully below, Defendants’ actions violate, among other provisions of law, the Administrative Procedure Act, the Affordable Care Act, the guarantee of equal protection enshrined in the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, and the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.”
“[The Trump Administration] replaced science and evidence-based medical reasoning with political calculation,” says Attorney General Josh Shapiro. “The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is filing a lawsuit in federal court to stop them.”
The Women’s Law Project is a public interest law center in Pennsylvania devoted to advancing the rights of women and girls.
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