Pandering to anti-abortion zealots with a side of California bashing? For Donald Trump and his lackeys, the answer is an eager “Yes, please!” Trump’s Health and Human Services Department is planning to go after California’s requirement for health insurers to cover abortion The Wall Street Journal reports, and federal funding could be on the line.
“The administration is expected to say that California’s requirement violates a federal law banning government entities that get federal money from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services from discriminating against health-care organizations because they don’t provide abortion or abortion coverage,” The Wall Street Journal reports based on “two sources familiar with the planning.”
A California state court already dismissed a challenge to the abortion coverage requirement, and doubtless the administration’s move to overturn the requirement will lead to a court battle—possibly not just in California but in other states with similar policies, including Oregon, New York, and Washington.
Trump is a man who routinely belittles and degrades anyone who dares disagree with him and who assuredly spent the first several decades of his adulthood seeing abortion as a personal convenience, but according to a spokesman, he’s a “champion for life and human dignity.” Nonsense. He’s a champion for turning out the Republican base in the most cynical ways possible.