HHS Could Be Breaking the Law
The Trump administration’s Dept. of Health and Human Services is blocking the public from viewing over 10,500 comments submitted in response to its proposed “faith-based” rule that would affect healthcare access for transgender patients, and access to abortion services. Under President Trump, HHS is trying to provide religious or “faith-based” organizations with special rights, a religious exemption, to allow them to discriminate based on a claim of religious belief.Â
By law, federal agencies are required to have a public comments period and are required to view those comments and make them public when considering a rule change. The Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 helps ensure appropriate checks on federal agencies.
But according to Politico, HHS “has instead posted 80 comments — less than 1 percent of all submissions — that overwhemingly back the administration’s anti-abortion policies or attack regulations advanced by the Obama administration, such as a rule forcing health care providers that accept federal funding to provide services to transgender patients.”
The Hill explains the HHS proposal “would remove regulations for religious groups ‘in order for these institutions to participate in HHS-funded or regulated programs.'” It’s one more brazen attempt by the Trump administration to remove the wall separating church and state.
The Trump administration has moved to remove regulations on religious groups. Trump officials rolled back the ObamaCare contraception mandate earlier this year, but a federal judge blocked the repeal last week.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State’s Alison Tanner tells Politico that if HHS doesn’t do an about face and make all 10,729 comments accessible to the public, “there may be grounds” for an Administrative Procedure Act “challenge for whatever rule comes out of the process.”
In other words, Americans United, which has already filed a Freedom of Information Act request, may take HHS to court, and could win a block on the new HHS rule.
“What HHS is really asking for, is how the agency needs to change its rules to allow religiously affiliated organizations to discriminate with government funds, against who they hire and serve and in what services they provide,” Americans United said in a blog post last month.
The HHS “faith-based” proposal, Politico notes, “represents a top priority of religious groups that have chafed under regulations such as the 2016 Obama administration directive on serving transgender patients. HHS chose to repeatedly highlight comments that attacked that regulation.”
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