On April 2, 2025, the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, a case that—depending on how the Court rules—could have outsized impact on the availability of essential reproductive and other health care for the most vulnerable communities within South Carolina and nationwide. In Medina, Planned Parenthood South Atlantic challenged the South Carolina Governor’s executive order preventing people who rely on Medicaid from accessing covered health care at their clinics in the state. Although this case raises a narrow legal question—whether Medicaid beneficiaries can sue in federal courts to enforce the Medicaid Act’s “free-choice of provider” provision—much more is at stake.    

At oral argument, questions about congressional intent and statutory interpretation dominated, but before the court were also the voices of hundreds of amici curiae— also known as friends of the court—who wrote briefs in support of Respondent Planned Parenthood to emphasize the real-world impacts of the outcome in this case. These voices on behalf of the most impacted communities, often not seen in the courtroom or heard at argument, offer critical insight on the reasons Medicaid—and the right of people who rely on it to select their preferred providers for essential health care—is critical to the health and well-being of systemically disadvantaged communities.  

As argued in a brief filed by eighteen organizations dedicated to advancing reproductive rights, health, and justice, the health care system has already diminished the trust of communities of color due to racial and ethnic biases and historically oppressive practices such as forced sterilization. Allowing an individual to choose a provider they feel comfortable with and that addresses their individual needs is essential in protecting bodily autonomy and agency.  And, as highlighted in another amicus brief, this is especially urgent in South Carolina, a state with “staggeringly large maternal and contraceptive deserts.” South Carolina’s actions will impose significant health care barriers for women, low-income individuals, communities of color, LGBTQ+ people, and others disenfranchised groups that disproportionately rely on Medicaid coverage for essential health care, including wellness and preventative care, cancer screenings, contraceptive services, full options pregnancy counseling, prenatal care, and STD and STI testing and treatment. Indeed, as amici emphasize, Medicaid participants from marginalized groups often choose Planned Parenthood as their qualified provider because they provide them with culturally competent, dignified, high quality care they trust. The amici further showed how eliminating Planned Parenthood as a provider under Medicaid would likely exacerbate existing disparities and runs contrary to evidence-based policies that are known to support women’s and children’s health and wellbeing. Multiple other amicus briefs, including from South Carolina healthcare experts and local government officials nationwide raise related concerns. Collectively, amici demonstrate why the ability to sue in federal court “provide[s] a critical avenue for communities of color and populations that have been systematically disenfranchised by political and legal systems to seek redress.”    

In contrast, an attorney for the conservative legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom—who served as counsel for South Carolina—argued that because the relevant provision did not employ specific words for its “rights-creating language,” (terms like “right,” “entitlement”, “privilege”, or “immunity,”) and no alternative remedy had been pursued, individuals could not sue in federal court if the state failed to comply with the provision. The federal government backed this argument at argument despite taking the opposite position for the past twenty years. In response, counsel for Planned Parenthood Southern Atlantic argued that the governor’s order is a direct violation of the provision’s “mandatory, individual-centric, rights-creating language” and there is no alternative federal remedy that specifically allows injured individuals to sue to enforce this right. In addition, counsel emphasized that Congress’s intent in enacting the provision was to combat artificial state-imposed limitations on health care and that conferring this enforceable right to individuals was important to prevent states from imposing limitations unrelated to medical qualifications, like being an abortion provider, as South Carolina sought to do.  As Justice Sotomayor noted, it would be “odd” that the federal government would advance a position that made withholding Medicaid money from non-complying states and thereby depriving thousands of other Medicaid recipients of coverage, the only remedy.    

The evidence presented in the amicus briefs, along with these arguments at Court, demonstrate why the stakes are so high: If the Court decides that the provision confers no actionable right for individuals, other states may follow in South Carolina’s footsteps to likewise limit health care options for Medicaid recipients—for a multitude of political or ideological reasons unrelated to quality of care. As amicus the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists warns, states arbitrarily excluding qualified providers from their state’s Medicaid plan would be devastating to public health across the country.  By “overwhelm[ing] a system already stretched thin,” they warn, we can expect to see more outcomes like the unprecedented HIV outbreak in Indiana and the rapid increase in maternal mortality in Texas following the enactment of similar policies. 

The Court is expected to issue a ruling by the end of the term in June 2025. 

Join UCLA Life Sciences on May 15, 2025, at 5:30 PM PT for Let’s Talk Science: IVF & Emerging Reproductive Technologies. Hosted by Dean of Life Sciences, Tracy Johnson, and featuring CRHLP's executive director Melissa Goodman, this webinar will bring together leading UCLA experts to discuss the science, practice, and policy of IVF and its evolving role in reproductive health. Don't miss this important conversation on the future of IVF and reproductive technologies! Register here to attend.

Photo Credit: llustration by Maya Chastain

In a recent move by the Trump administration, over 100 employees from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), including those working at the Division of Reproductive Health, were fired, disrupting critical programs aimed at supporting maternal and child health. This included teams responsible for promoting healthy pregnancies, such as those working on assisted reproductive technology (ART) and the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring Program (PRAMS), both of which were vital in collecting and analyzing data on fertility, maternal health, and pregnancy outcomes. Experts warn that eliminating these programs risks worsening the maternal mortality crisis and reducing access to vital healthcare for women and children. The abrupt closures of these programs leave state and local health departments without essential federal support, with potential long-term consequences for maternal and child health across the country.

Photo credit:  Michael Gonzalez/The Texas Tribune

The ongoing battle over doctors’ ability to provide life and health preserving abortions in Texas is now playing out in the state legislature. Sponsors of a newly introduced bill, which would not decriminalize abortion in the state, say it would clarify when doctors can perform an abortion to save a pregnant patient's life or preserve major bodily functions. However, providers and patients explain why it will not work in practice and experts monitoring anti-abortion strategies in state legislatures warn it is a “trojan horse” that could be used to argue that older, now unenforced, laws such as one from 1857 could be revived  to potentially penalize those helping women travel out of state for an abortion. Whether or not this bill advances, it is an example of how legislators in states like Texas are refusing to decriminalize abortion despite mounting evidence on how bans threaten the lives and health of pregnant people.  

Photo credit: Mickey Welsh/AP

A federal district court in Alabama ruled that the state’s threats to prosecute individuals and organizations helping abortion-seekers travel to other states for legal abortion care is unconstitutional. The decision came nearly three years after the Alabama Attorney General first threatened healthcare providers and abortion funds with the prospect of felony charges if they assisted people in accessing abortion outside the state. The decision affirmed that despite the state ban on abortion, reproductive justice groups like Yellowhammer Fund, that provide mutual aid, are engaging in constitutionally protected speech and their clients are exercising a fundamental right to travel. This ruling restores vital community-based support for Alabamians seeking abortion care, as plaintiffs can now –safe from the threat of prosecution – resume providing information, funding, and travel assistance to its community members.

Photo credit: Sergio Flores/Getty Images

This month, a federal judge in Nevada ruled that a parental notification law passed 40 years ago can be enforced for the first time starting April 30. The Nevada law requires minors to seek a court order for an abortion without parental notification. The judge’s decision reinstates the law, which had been enjoined as unconstitutional under Roe v. Wade when it was first passed in 1985. After Dobbs overruled Roe, anti-abortion lawyer James Bopp filed a lawsuit on behalf of district attorneys seeking to enforce the law. Planned Parenthood, plaintiffs in the 1985 lawsuit, argued the law remains unconstitutionally vague and violates minors' rights to due process and equal protection. The judge found that those claims were not presented to the court in the current litigation and left open the possibility of further legal challenges.

Photo Credit: Alyssa Pointer/Reuters

In an update to a case covered in our last newsletter, a Georgia district attorney has decided to drop charges against a woman who had been arrested after miscarrying and allegedly disposing of fetal remains. The woman was initially charged, in March, with concealing the death of another person and abandonment of a dead body after first responders found her unconscious and bleeding from a miscarriage. After significant public attention to the case, the district attorney dismissed the charges. The DA stated that the woman did not violate any laws, and that continuing prosecution would not be legally sustainable or in the interest of justice. 

With so much going on in the world of reproductive health, law, and policy, every week we'll share articles, books, and media you might have missed. 

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Anti-Abortion Advocacy Is Rising on College Campuses

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Reimagining the future of reproductive health, law, and policy.

UCLA Center on Reproductive Health, Law, and Policy is a think tank and research center created to develop long-term, lasting solutions that advance all aspects of reproductive justice, and address the current national crisis of abortion access.