SANTA CRUZ — A federal judge has halted a provision in Congress’ newly passed spending bill that cuts Planned Parenthood off from Medicaid reimbursements, but it won’t be enough to bring back the clinic in downtown Santa Cruz that closed last week with little notice.
Andrew Adams, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood Mar Monte — the umbrella group that oversaw Santa Cruz’s Westside Clinic branch, told the Sentinel Tuesday that the affiliate applauds the injunction handed down Monday by a U.S. District judge in Massachusetts, but doesn’t think it’s the end of the story.
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“While this is a key victory, the fight is far from over. We know the Trump administration will almost certainly appeal this preliminary injunction and use every tactic at their disposal to seek to destroy Planned Parenthood as an organization, to stop abortion care, and to block federal funding for sexual and reproductive health care,” Adams wrote. “(Planned Parenthood Mar Monte) is not backing down from this fight. Defunding Planned Parenthood is an unconstitutional attack that will decimate abortion access nationwide and harm patients who use Medicaid. We will not back down, but we must have the resources to continue this fight while keeping as many doors open to patient care as possible.”
The provision within the federal spending bill, President Donald Trump’s signature piece of legislation so far in his second term, included a rule that imposed a one-year ban on Medicaid reimbursements, or Medi-Cal in California, starting July 4 to providers that received more than $800,000 in federal funds in 2023 and conduct reproductive health care. While Planned Parenthood wasn’t named specifically, the organization and many other local political and health care leaders said there’s little doubt the rule was stuffed into the bill in order to kneecap Planned Parenthood services.
In response, 47 Planned Parenthood affiliates, including Mar Monte, sued the federal government to halt the provision and were granted a two-week restraining order that expired July 21.
But despite this latest legal victory, Mar Monte, Planned Parenthood’s largest affiliate in the country, doesn’t believe Medicaid reimbursements for sexual and reproductive health care will be available in the future. Therefore, all five locations that closed last Thursday will remain that way.
“With 3.5 years remaining of the Trump administration, (Planned Parenthood Mar Monte) is strategically planning for a sustainable business model that will keep as many doors open as possible–without the security of federal funding for Medicaid reimbursement,” Adams wrote. “For now, we’ll be able to resume billing for Medicaid reimbursements for patients, but the federal government has said it plans to challenge the injunction and will attempt to take back all the funds paid if the injunction is reversed (millions of dollars for patient care).”
The Santa Cruz’s Planned Parenthood branch, which served 4,699 patients last year, was first established in 1971 and continued to provide services uninterrupted for 54 years. Planned Parenthood Mar Monte’s Watsonville location remains open.