By Tyler Arnold
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 20, 2025 /
14:50 pm
Two American Catholic bishops are hailing a Republican-led legislative effort to end certain taxpayer funds for abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood as well as an attempt to block funding for transgender drugs and surgeries for children.
Proposed budget language currently being considered in the U.S. House of Representatives would prevent Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers from receiving Medicaid reimbursements for any services. It would also end all reimbursements for transgender drugs or surgeries that doctors prescribe for children.
“Americans should not be forced to subsidize abortions and ‘gender transition’ services with their tax dollars,” Toledo, Ohio, Bishop Daniel Thomas and Bishop Robert Barron of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota, said in a joint statement on Monday from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).
Thomas is the chairman of the USCCB’s pro-life committee, while Barron chairs the Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth.
Under current law, federal tax money cannot directly fund most abortions, but abortion clinics can still receive federal funding if the money is used in other ways. A Government Accountability Office report found that Planned Parenthood pulled in more than $1.75 billion in taxpayer funds in 2019 and 2021 from a variety of sources.
Planned Parenthood’s 2023-2024 annual report stated that the organization received nearly $800 million in taxpayer funding over a 12-month period, which accounted for almost 40% of its total revenue.
“For decades, Planned Parenthood has received government money and offered low-income women one terrible option: to end the lives of their babies,” Thomas and Barron said.
“More recently, they have used the same taxpayer funds to expand their destructive offerings by promoting gender ideology and providing puberty blockers and hormones to minors, turning them into lifelong patients in the process.”
“Americans should not be forced to subsidize abortions and ‘gender transition’ services with their tax dollars, and we applaud measures that will finally help to defund Planned Parenthood,” they added.
“We encourage greater support for authentic, life-affirming health care providers that serve mothers and their children in need. We urge all members of Congress and the administration to work in good faith to protect vulnerable women and children from mutilating ‘gender transition’ services and the scourge of abortion.”
The proposed language is part of the so-called “One, Big, Beautiful Bill” that would set the nation’s budget and incorporate elements of President Donald Trump’s agenda. The legislation would only need a majority support in the House and the Senate.
The bill bypasses the usual 60-vote threshold needed in the Senate because certain budget bills only require a simple majority.
Although the bishops have voiced support for this part of the budget bill, they have criticized other proposed elements of the bill. Specifically, the USCCB opposes structural changes to Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which the bishops worry could reduce access to the programs.
The proposed Medicaid reforms include work requirements for able-bodied adults under the age of 65 if they do not have young children as dependents and shifting some Medicaid costs to states if they offer benefits to immigrants who are in the country illegally.
Some of the proposed SNAP changes include shifting between 5% and 25% of the cost to states, raising the work requirement age from 54 to 64, and implementing stricter verifications to ensure money does not go to immigrants who are in the country illegally.
If the House passes its version of the bill, it will then go to the Senate, where lawmakers will likely make changes and send it back to the House. It is not yet scheduled for a vote in the House.
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Tyler Arnold is a staff reporter for Catholic News Agency, based in EWTN News’ Washington Bureau. He previously worked at The Center Square and has been published in a variety of outlets, including The Associated Press, National Review, The American Conservative, and The Federalist.
