The Biden administration is withdrawing its proposed set of regulations to expand access to contraception.
According to POLITICO, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a notice in the Federal Register on Monday that the regulations would be rescinded. This would have prohibited employers from claiming an exemption based on “non-religious moral objections” to the Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandate.
In the final weeks of the Biden administration, the HHS will “focus their time and resources on matters other than finalizing these rules,” the notice said.
“This document withdraws a notice of proposed rulemaking that appeared in the Federal Register on February 2, 2023, regarding coverage of certain preventive services under the Affordable Care Act. time and resources on matters other than finalizing these rules,” it stated.
“Section 2713 of the Public Health Service Act (PHS Act), as added by the Affordable Care Act and incorporated into the Employee Retirement Income Security Act and the Internal Revenue Code, requires non-grandfathered group health plans and health insurance issuers offering non-grandfathered group or individual health insurance coverage to provide coverage of certain recommended preventive services without imposing any cost-sharing requirements. These preventive services include, with respect to women, under comprehensive guidelines supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration, certain contraceptive services. Current regulations include exemptions and optional accommodations for entities and individuals with religious objections or non-religious moral objections to coverage of contraceptive services,” it explained further.
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“The proposed rules would have rescinded the regulation providing for an exemption based on non-religious moral objections. The proposed rules would also have established a new individual contraceptive arrangement that individuals in plans or coverage subject to a religious exemption could use to obtain contraceptive services at no cost directly from a provider or facility that furnishes contraceptive services, without any involvement on the part of an objecting entity,” it added.
“The Departments have determined it appropriate to withdraw the proposed rules at this time to focus their time and resources on matters other than finalizing these rules. Additionally, in light of the volume and breadth of scope of the comments received, the Departments want to further consider the proposals made in the proposed rules,” it said.
The Biden administration’s fixation on birth control access was part of its greater, radical pro-abortion agenda, which they touted as so-called “reproductive health care.” This included expanding abortion services, including loosening regulations surrounding dangerous telemedicine abortions. This is the process where a woman never sees a doctor in-person. Instead, she is prescribed abortion medication over the phone or internet and receives the pills in the mail. From there, she can carry out the abortion at home.
In January 2023, HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra claimed that “access to and coverage of birth control is critical” and “to women across the country, we have your back.”
After the HHS published its notice this week, conservative groups celebrated.
“Christmas came a little early this year,” the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty wrote on X, pointing out that the “Obamacare” birth control mandate tried to force a group of nuns to cover abortions in their employee health plans.
.@HHSGov unilaterally withdrew proposed new rules governing the Contraceptive Mandate—the same mandate which originally tried to force the Little Sisters to cover abortions in their employee healthcare plans.
— BECKET (@BECKETlaw) December 24, 2024
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