SCOTUS Rules Planned Parenthood Cannot Sue Over South Carolina Defunding
In a major victory for states' rights and the sanctity of life, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that South Carolina can lawfully bar Medicaid funding from flowing to Planned Parenthood — a blow to the abortion giant's legal campaign to cling to taxpayer dollars.
The 6–3 ruling in Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic delivers a critical legal precedent: low-income Medicaid patients do not have a federal “right” to sue states to keep abortion-linked clinics in Medicaid networks.
At the heart of the case was whether patients could sue South Carolina under Section 1983 of the Civil Rights Act of 1871 to preserve access to their “preferred” provider — even one mired in controversy, like Planned Parenthood. The majority on the Court said no.
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View Plans“Section 1983 permits private plaintiffs to sue for violations of federal spending-power statutes only in ‘atypical’ situations… where the provision in question ‘clear[ly]’ and ‘unambiguous[ly]’ confers an individual ‘right,’” wrote Justice Neil Gorsuch in the majority opinion. “The law in question is not such a statute.”
Gorsuch rightly noted that policy decisions — especially those involving spending taxpayer money — belong to the people’s elected representatives, not unelected judges or activist attorneys working on behalf of the abortion industry.
“Private enforcement actions… can force governments to direct money away from public services and spend it instead on litigation,” Gorsuch wrote. “The job of resolving how best to weigh those competing costs and benefits belongs to the people’s elected representatives.”
The ruling stems from a 2018 order by South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster, who directed the state’s Department of Health and Human Services to remove abortion clinics — specifically Planned Parenthood — from its Medicaid provider list. McMaster argued the policy was about protecting taxpayer dollars from subsidizing organizations entangled in abortion, regardless of federal technicalities about direct funding.
Despite abortion advocates attempting to frame the case as one of “general healthcare access,” South Carolina officials — supported by conservative legal powerhouse Alliance Defending Freedom — maintained that the state has more than 200 other publicly funded healthcare clinics ready and able to serve low-income patients with real medical services, minus the abortion agenda.
The usual suspects on the left — Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan — dissented, accusing the majority of using a “narrow and ahistorical” interpretation. In reality, the decision restores basic constitutional order: unelected bureaucrats and judges shouldn’t be forcing states to partner with Planned Parenthood.
Planned Parenthood, predictably, claimed the fight was about “access to contraception and cancer screenings.” But make no mistake — this was about preserving their presence in Medicaid networks to keep the cash flowing, even in states like South Carolina that overwhelmingly reject their abortion-first mission.
Federal law already prohibits Medicaid funding for abortion services in nearly all cases. South Carolina has gone a step further, enacting legislation that protects unborn children once a heartbeat is detected, around six weeks into pregnancy.
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View PlansThis case, which began after McMaster’s 2018 executive order, had been blocked by lower courts until now. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals had previously sided with Planned Parenthood — a ruling now decisively overturned by the Supreme Court.
South Carolina’s courageous stand — and the Supreme Court’s constitutional affirmation — underscores a broader shift: states no longer have to bend the knee to Planned Parenthood’s demands.