Tag Archives: Topic: Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)

Sarah Torre at Heritage Foundation: As Alliance Defending Freedom wrote in a public comment on Monday on behalf of over 20 Catholic colleges, “No other federal rule has so narrowly and discriminatorily defined what it means to exercise religious conscience, and no regulation has ever so directly violated plain statutory and constitutional religious freedoms. The NPRM does nothing to change that fact.”

LifeNews: The pro-life group Priests for Life was one of the earliest organizations to file a lawsuit against the Obama administration over its HHS mandate. The mandate compels religious groups to pay for birth control drugs and drugs like ella that can cause very early abortions.

Harvard School of Public Health video is here. Alliance Alert readers may be particularly interested in the exchange that begins at 49 minutes.

The Hill: In a letter to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the 12 secular organizations argue the rules would allow too many employers to duck the requirement that their insurance coverage include contraception.

Washington Times: “As of Aug. 1, 2013, every employee who doesn’t work directly for a church or a diocese will be included in the benefit package,” Mrs. Sebelius said at a forum moderated by Reuters that was held at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Baptist Press: The Obama administration’s continued refusal to provide conscience protections in its abortion/contraception mandate is “a form of religious persecution,” according to the Southern Baptist Convention’s ethics entity. The critique by the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) came in a comment submitted Monday (April 8) to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

ProLifeBlogs: The Knights of Columbus filed formal comments with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services today, calling on the Administration to rescind the unpopular healthcare mandate that will force Americans of faith to cover medical services that violate their consciences without regard for their First Amendment’s rights.

LifeSiteNews: With the comment period now closed, the Obama administration will begin formally composing the regulatory language of the controversial HHS mandate. The process will likely reinvigorate attempts to have the provision legally overturned, an effort that ultimately seems destined to end at the Supreme Court.

Cardinal Newman Society: The joint comment, prepared by the expert attorneys at the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), is posted online here. The comment asks the Obama administration to exempt all organizations with “a religious or moral objection from being forced to provide, offer, pay for or in any way participate in a health insurance plan that covers or specifically triggers coverage of‘contraceptives’ (including abortifacients… ), sterilization, and related education and counseling. Religious freedom requires no less.”

Huffington Post: The number of lawsuits challenging the Obama administration’s contraception coverage mandate climbed to 60 last week, and legal experts on both sides of the issue are predicting that the Supreme Court will take up the issue within the year.

Religion Clause Blog: In MK Chambers Co. v. Department of Health and Human Services, (ED MI, April 3, 2013), a Michigan federal district court refused to issue an ex parte temporary restraining order to prevent enforcement of the Affordable Care Act contraceptive coverage mandate against a closely-held machinery components company and its two Catholic owners.

The Ruth Institute provides more information.

Edward Mechmann at the Archdiocese of New York: But even more fundamental to our opposition to the bill is the understanding that current federal law on abortion is evil. It is a terrible injustice, it is a deplorable violation of basic human rights, and it is an ugly stain on our society’s character. We cannot accept or even obey such laws

SC Times: The Catholic deacon who owns American Manufacturing Company in St. Joseph has received a preliminary injunction protecting him from provisions in the Affordable Care Act. The injunction was issued Tuesday in the 8th Circuit of the federal district courts by U.S. District Court Judge John R. Tunheim. | Hall v. Sebelius, Preliminary Injunction

The Christian Civic League has posted this information page.

NewsOK: A panel of nine federal appeals court judges will hear oral arguments in Hobby Lobby Stores Inc.’s fight against part of the Affordable Care Act on May 23 in Denver.

Religion Clause: The Attorneys General of 13 states last week submitted to the Department of Health and Human Services a joint letter (full text) commenting on the Department’s proposed rules that attempt to accommodate objections raised by non-profit religious organizations to the scope of the Affordable Care Act contraceptive coverage mandate.

LifeNews: After a terse debate in the Virginia House, members of the Assembly voted today to stop taxpayer funding of abortions in the Obamacare exchange.

Kathryn Jean Lopez at NRO: Americans concerned with the narrowing of conscience rights in the United States have through Monday, April 8, to file comments with the Department of Health and Human Services in opposition to the latest iteration of the Obama administration’s abortion-drug, contraception, sterilization employer-insurance mandate under the president’s health-care law. Maureen Ferguson of the Catholic Association talked to National Review Online about the religious-liberty problem that remains for individuals and religious service institutions with moral objections to any and all of these requirements.

LifeNews: Health and Human Services’ Office of Adolescence Health is giving Planned Parenthood of Greater Orlando $2,388,950 in grant funding for its “Teens Rise!” project.

Seattle Times: State Sen. Steve Hobbs, D-Lake Stevens, says a House bill requiring health-insurance plans to cover abortions has the 25 votes needed to pass the Senate. He released a letter Monday with the signatures of 25 senators, as a hearing was being held in the Senate on House Bill 1044. The legislation passed the House 53-43 in February.

Columbian.com: Hospitals are supposed to be places of healing, but Washington’s hospitals are becoming places of conflict between religion and government over health care services.

Christian News: The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals announced on Friday that Hobby Lobby’s appeal will go before the entire court as per the company’s request. Cases are customarily held before a panel of three judges, except in what are called en banc hearings.

CBS: A new statewide poll in Virginia shows a sharp societal divide over the question of whether to expand Medicaid — something that won’t happen for a while in the state because of reform hurdles Gov. Bob McDonnell has set for it.

Think Progress: The Center for Arizona Policy is using an opinion from the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian legal-defense organization, to argue that the draft Medicaid legislation should be amended to disqualify the non-profit women’s health provider Planned Parenthood from receiving public money. [...]

Mary K. Reinhart at AZ Republic: The Center for Arizona Policy is using an opinion from the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian legal-defense organization, to argue that the draft Medicaid legislation should be amended to disqualify the non-profit women’s health provider Planned Parenthood from receiving public money. (excerpt also posted on CNN and Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report)

Business Week: Haslam, 55, a Republican, told lawmakers yesterday that Obama’s health-care overhaul might force hospitals to close as they lose money now channeled to caring for the poor.

ConnectTriStates.com: Missouri’s Catholic bishops have joined the chorus urging the appeal of a federal court ruling striking down the state’s contraception insurance exemption for people with religious or moral objections.

LifeSiteNews: A federal judge has dismissed the lawsuit a Catholic television network filed against the HHS mandate that compel it to pay for birth control and drugs that may cause abortions for its employees.

Religion Clause Blog: In Franciscan University of Steubenville v. Sebelius, (SD OH, March 22. 2013), an Ohio federal district court, following the lead of 15 other federal courts, dismissed for lack of ripeness a challenge to the Affordable Care Act contraceptive coverage mandate in a suit brought by two Catholic non-profits.

LifeNews: Members of the Senate voted today on a mostly party-line vote to reaffirm the controversial HHS mandate, that compels religious groups to pay for birth control and abortion-causing drugs despite their religious or moral objections.

Florida Baptist Witness: Kellie Fiedorek, litigation counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), said this is a time of “great peril” for religious adherents. In particular, business owners with religious convictions about business, marriage and family are the targets of attacks for refusing to violate their beliefs, she said. “You couldn’t expect an African-American photographer to take a picture of a family who is in the KKK, who is going to wear long white robes and pointy hats,” Fiedorek said. “Similarly, you couldn’t expect a Jewish … baker to bake a cake with swastikas on it and have it say, ‘Happy Birthday to Hitler.’”

USCCB: The general counsel of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops states that the current proposed revisions of the Obama Administration’s contraceptive mandate are “an unprecedented …violation of religious liberty by the federal government” and must be changed.

The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC), a national non-profit public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, today announced that it has filed its fourth legal challenge to the HHS Mandate. This fourth case was filed yesterday on behalf of Michael Potter, Chairman and President of Eden Foods and his for-profit company, Eden Foods, Inc. in the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.

DFW Catholic: “Every American should be free to live and do business according to their faith,” said Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot. “The government shouldn’t punish people of faith for following their beliefs when making decisions for themselves or their organizations. That’s why this lawsuit should not be casually dismissed as the Obama administration would like to see happen.”

CNSNews: The Catholic bishops of the United States are asking the Republican-controlled House of Representatives to do something concrete and effective–rather than merely symbolic—to repeal a regulation the administration has issued under Obamacare that will force Catholics and other Christians to act against their faith in purchasing or providing health-care plans that cover sterilizations, contraceptives, and abortion-inducing drugs.

Ed Whelan at NRO: In a Public Discourse essay today, law professor (and Becket Fund lawyer) Mark Rienzi explains that “there is no principled basis for excluding profit-making businesses and their owners from the protection of our religious liberty laws.” Among the points he makes in the essay (and in the much longer law-review article from which the essay is drawn):

LifeSiteNews: Bishop Paul Swain said the action of Avera Health Plans has created “public scandal,” because its practices are “inconsistent with Church teaching.

AP: A federal judge has struck down a Missouri law exempting moral objectors from mandatory birth control coverage because it conflicts with an insurance requirement under President Barrack Obama’s health care law . . . “The point of the law was to tell health insurance companies that they’re supposed to honor the wishes – pro or con – of people who have religious or ethical objections to what’s in the policy,” said Timothy Belz, a St. Louis attorney who represented Our Lady’s Inn. | Missouri Insurance Coalition v. Huff (E.D. Mo. March 14, 2013)

LifeNews: Today, the Thomas More Law Center, a pro-life legal group, informed LifeNews that Federal District Court Judge Lawrence P. Zatkoff of the Eastern District of Michigan granted a Motion for a Preliminary Injunction against enforcement of the HHS Mandate it filed for Monaghan and his property management company, Domino’s Farm Corporation.

LifeNews: Today, Thomas Beckwith, a devout Southern Baptist, and his family-owned Beckwith Electric Company, Inc, filed a federal lawsuit challenging a new form of tyranny and religious persecution—the HHS Mandate.

PRNewswire: AUL’s brief is filed in the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in Annex Medical, Inc. v. Sebelius, a case filed by a private, for-profit business based in Minnetonka, Minnesota and operated according to the owners’ Christian beliefs.

Nathan Cherry at Engage Family Minute: Lawmakers in the Ohio Legislature are set to introduce “The Health Care Freedom Act.” This bill is designed to protect citizens from the government imposed penalties associated with ObamaCare.

Robert Knight at Townhall: Here’s more from the brief: “In 2012, Liberty University employed 6,900 people, with net claims for its self-insured health insurance of $14,214,000. Yet Liberty University would be fined $20,700,000 ($3,000 times 6,900) if only one employee meets the 9.5 percent “unaffordable” criterion. “That penalty would be on top of the additional penalty of $2,000 per employee ($13,800,000) that Liberty University would have to pay for providing coverage excluding abortifacients, for a total combined penalty of $34,500,000. That would be in addition to the $14,214,000 that Liberty University paid in claims for its health insurance coverage in 2012.” Result? This would “tax or penalize Liberty University out of existence.”

Reality Check: It looks like we’ll have to update that list to 19, because Colorado mortgage banking company Cherry Creek Mortgage has just filed suit challenging the mandate as well. Cherry Creek Mortgage is owned by former U.S. Senator Bill Armstrong and does business in 27 states. The company has 730 employees and is represented by Alliance Defending Freedom in its lawsuit.

CNSNews: When the U.S. Senate this week takes up the continuing resolution to fund the federal government for the remainder of fiscal year 2013, Sen. Ted Cruz (R.-Texas) will offer an amendment that will prohibit funding for the implementation of Obamacare during that period.

LifeNews: On Friday, Westminster Theological Seminary joined the throng of challengers to the unconstitutional HHS mandate that forces employers to violate their consciences or pay large fines. Westminster, which is represented by prominent Houston litigator Ken Wynne, moved to intervene in the Becket Fund’s lawsuit on behalf of East Texas Baptist University and Houston Baptist University in Houston federal district court.

NewOK.com: Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. is asking a federal appeals court to expedite its case against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in hopes of avoiding millions of dollars in fines the company could face this summer for failing to cover the cost of emergency contraceptives for its employees.

Catholic Culture: A US district court judge in western Pennsylvania has ruled a lawsuit filed by the Seneca Hardwood Lumber Company against the HHS mandate may proceed. The for-profit company is owned by a Catholic family. (links to ADF Media press release and the complaint)

Religion Clause Blog: Finally, in what may be a first in the many decisions handed down so far in challenges to the mandate, the court held that “plaintiffs set forth sufficient factual allegations to support a plausible claim that the notice and comment requirements of the APA were violated.” ADF issued a press release on the decision.

The HIll: Freedom Works, for example, was livid that GOP leaders refused to allow a floor vote on an amendment to defund the implementation of President Obama’s healthcare law . . . “Rep. (John) Fleming (R-La.) believes, as he stated in a letter to leadership last week, that the CR [continuing resolution] was a prime opportunity to move conscience legislation that would restore protections stripped away by Obamacare,” Fleming spokesman Doug Sachtleben explained in a statement to The Hill.

Christianity Today: The court acknowledged Geneva College’s standing to challenge the mandate but ultimately dismissed the claim because the school actually may be exempt. The Alliance Defense Fund intends to appeal the decision.

World Net Daily: Americans should be free to honor God and live according to their consciences in their homes, churches, and businesses,” said Senior Counsel Michael Norton of the Alliance Defending Freedom, which is representing Armstrong. “Senator Armstrong believed in that constitutional principle when he served in the U.S. Senate, and he believes in that principle today. He, his fellow co-owners, and family members that work with him believe firmly that no one should be forced to choose between their faith and their job.”

Catholic Culture links to several media reports and the Alliance Alert Sioux Manufacturing case name tag.

Charisma News: Obamacare’s employer mandate has become the “bludgeon” with which the government feels empowered to cripple the consciences of religious employers. That’s the argument of a friend-of-the-court brief that Alliance Defending Freedom, Americans United for Life, and several state family policy councils filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit Thursday.

One News Now: The lawsuit was filed by Alliance Defending Freedom. ADF senior counsel Michael J. Norton tells American Family News that Christians should be free to practice their faith at church, at home, and in their places of business. “Senator Armstrong believed in that constitutional principle when he served in the United States Senate, and he believes in that principle even more strongly today,” says Norton. “He, his fellow co-owners, and family members who work with him believe firmly that no one should be forced to choose between their faith and their job.

Denver Post (updated): “All the owners are evangelical Christians who specifically object to being forced to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs and devices,” said the company’s attorneys with the Alliance Defending Freedom in a statement released late Wednesday.

LifeNews: “Americans, including those who create and provide jobs, should be free to live according to their faith rather than be forced into surrendering their consciences,” said Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Casey Mattox. “ObamaCare demands that Americans choose between two poison pills: either desert your faith to comply with the government, or resist and be punished. The Obama administration’s attacks on faith and employers prove that it doesn’t respect either one.”

CBN: Alliance Defending Freedom, which represents the two organizations, was pleased with the court’s Seneca ruling. “All Americans, including job creators and providers, should be free to live according to their faith rather than be forced into violating their own consciences,” ADF Senior Legal Counsel Matt Bowman said.

YouTube: Victims of the Obama Administration’s assault on religious freedom speak out at Rep. Black’s press conference in support of the Health Care Conscience Rights Act. Speakers included:

ObamaCare’s employer mandate has become the “bludgeon” with which the government feels empowered to cripple the consciences of religious employers.

Denver Post: All the owners are evangelical Christians who specifically object to being forced to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs and devices,” said the company’s attorneys with the Alliance Defending Freedom in a statement released late Wednesday.

CNSNews: The Republican-controlled House of Representatives voted 267-151 on Wednesday to approve a $982-billion continuing resolution (CR) to fund the federal government through the rest of fiscal 2013 that fully funds the implementation of Obamacare during that period.

All Americans, including jobs creators and providers, should be free to live according to their faith rather than be forced into violating their own consciences.

Rienzi, Mark, God and the Profits: Is There Religious Liberty for Money-Makers? (March 7, 2013). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=

Religion Clause Blog: In Sioux Chief Mfg. Co., Inc. v. Sebelius, (WD MO, Feb. 28, 2013), a Missouri federal district court, with the consent of both parties, enjoined enforcement of the Affordable Care Act contraceptive coverage . . . he complaint (full text) in Armstrong v. Sebelius, (D CO, filed 3/5/2013), alleges . . . Because there was not time to seek judicial relief before Jan. 1, the company (at least temporarily) kept the same coverage to comply with the mandate. An ADF press release reports on the filing of the lawsuit.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys representing a Colorado mortgage banking company co-owned by former U.S. Sen. Bill Armstrong filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the Obama administration’s abortion pill mandate.

LifeNews: The Obama administration should understand that it cannot force Americans to abandon their beliefs at the door of the workplace,” says Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot. “The Constitution simply doesn’t allow the government to involve itself in religion by deciding what faith is, who the faithful are, and when and where their faith may be lived out. Confining our faith to our homes and our churches is not the job of Washington bureaucrats.” “Americans should be free to honor God and live according to their consciences whether they are at home, church, or work,” adds lead counsel Jonathan R. Whitehead, one of nearly 2,200 allied attorneys with Alliance Defending Freedom. [more]

NC Register: Matt Bowman of the Alliance Defending Freedom, which is representing a number of plaintiffs in HHS cases, also welcomed the proposed legislation. While the Alliance Defending Freedom has argued in court that the federal contraception mandate violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, Bowman told the Register that the proposed conscience-rights bill “is more specific; it blocks the administration’s hostility to religion possibly without having to rely on the courts, and it makes court action to protect religious freedom more swift.”

Life News: The new Continuing Resolution introduced in the House of Representatives does not include the conscience protections against the Obama Administration’s HHS mandate that pro-life advocates were hoping for.

Wesley J. Smith at National Review: Alliance Defending Freedom has won another preliminary injunction against the free-birth-control rule based on the religious objections of a business owner, this time for a Missouri plumbing-supply company called Sioux Chief Manufacturing Co. Inc. What is interesting is that the injunction was unopposed by the feds. Welcome, but odd  . . .

Alan E. Sears at the Alliance Defending Freedom: The Obama administration’s notorious abortion pill mandate – which forces employers, regardless of their religious or moral convictions, to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs, sterilization, and contraception under threat of heavy penalties – is taking on water fast, as the reality sinks in with judges across the country that the measure is a massive legal assault on religious freedom.

Hot Air: In a little under an hour, three members of the House Republican caucus will announce a new legislative effort to undo the HHS contraception mandate’s infringement on freedom of religious practice, and prevent the next incursion as well.

Melodika.net: “With another phony compromise, the Obama Administration continues to insult the intelligence of the American people and trample our Constitutionally-guaranteed rights,” said AUL’s President and CEO Dr. Charmaine Yoest, as the Health and Human Services Department released additional regulations for Obamacare. “Our Freedom of Conscience, which is guaranteed by the First Amendment has been violated by Obamacare and these new regulations do not resolve the offense.”

Engage Family Minute: Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys and allied attorneys represent Sioux Chief Manufacturing Co. in a federal lawsuit filed last month to challenge the mandate, which forces employers—regardless of their religious or moral convictions—to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs, sterilization and contraception under threat of heavy penalties.“