ST. LOUIS — Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s office on Wednesday issued an order prohibiting Missouri’s Planned Parenthood clinics from providing medication abortions, even though the clinics are not yet providing medication abortions.
Planned Parenthood leaders say they are awaiting approval of complication plans they have submitted to the state health department, which they say they’ve been told is necessary before providing medication abortions.
But Bailey’s office issued cease-and-desist orders to Planned Parenthood Great Rivers and Planned Parenthood Great Plains, arguing that because of alleged violations of state regulations around 2018, that they will likely violate regulations again in the future.
“Especially in light of Planned Parenthood’s recent, pervasive and knowing violations of Missouri law, it is necessary to issue this Temporary Restraining Order to prohibit future violations,†sent to the Planned Parenthood affiliates.
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It is unknown how long the order will be in place.
Bailey to the affiliates on March 5, warning them of his intent to send desist orders because, he said, they were providing medication abortions without an approved complication plan. He gave them two days to respond.
The affiliate leaders called the threat baseless.
“AG Bailey’s attempt to gin up a fake story and score political points is a clear attempt to threaten and intimidate the state’s only abortion providers, but Planned Parenthood will not be deterred,†leaders stated Wednesday in a press release before the desist order was issued.
The Planned Parenthood affiliates each submitted complication plans to the Missouri Department of Health and Human Services on Feb. 20 and Feb. 21, as required according to their interpretation of a recent court ruling on the state’s medication abortion regulations.
Affiliate leaders also announced to the public that they are unable to provide medication abortions until they receive approval from DHSS.
Medications abortions involve taking two kinds of pills. The first medication would be taken at the Planned Parenthood clinic after consultation and the second up to two days later at home. The medications can be taken up to 12 weeks gestation.
A complication plan requires providers of medication abortions to have a written contract with an obstetrician who is “on-call and available twenty-four hours a day†to treat complications.
Bailey, however, sent his March 5 warning and issued a press release stating, “I will not stand by while Planned Parenthood continues to flout the law and put women’s lives at risk.â€
The warning read: “Whenever it appears to the attorney general that a person has engaged in, is engaging in or is about to engage in any method, act, use, practice or solicitation declared to be unlawful†under Missouri’s consumer-protection statute, the Attorney General may issue “an order prohibiting such person or persons from engaging or continuing to engage in such unlawful method, act, use, practice or solicitation.â€
The Planned Parenthood leaders responded with letters within two days. They shared those letters Tuesday with the media.
Margot Riphagen, CEO of Great Rivers, wrote: “Great Rivers has stated repeatedly, and publicly, that it is waiting for DHSS to approve its complication plan before providing medication abortion. To date, Great Rivers has received zero response from DHSS despite our repeated follow-up inquiries.â€
In addition, Riphagen went on to argue that the statute Bailey uses to issue his warning only covers consumer merchandise, “not the provision of health care.â€
“Your choice to ignore both law and fact demonstrates that care for the law and patient health are not your true motives here,†she wrote. “Rather, your aim is to try to harass and intimidate Great Rivers out of providing the safe, essential, constitutionally protected care its patients need.â€
Great Plain CEO Emily Wales sent a nearly identical letter.
“We look forward to hearing back from DHSS about our proposed complication plan,†they each wrote. “We would welcome your assistance in urging them to respond to our communications.â€
A week after the complications were submitted, DHSS spokeswoman Sami Jo Freeman told the Post-Dispatch, “I do not have an anticipated timeline for approval or denial of the pending complication plans.â€
Missourians in November approved Amendment 3, protecting the right to an abortion up to fetal viability. The Planned Parenthood affiliates have filed a lawsuit, seeing to remove multiple state regulations that have made it too difficult to provide abortions. The judge has temporarily halted some regulations as the case plays out, but not others.
Great Plains clinics in Kansas City and Columbia have begun offering procedural abortions on a limited basis up to 12 weeks gestation since procedural abortions do not require a complication plan.
Great Rivers is not yet offering procedural abortions in Missouri, saying its staff is currently concentrated at its busy clinic across the Missouri border in Fairview Heights, where providers face few restrictions.
The Supreme Court has preserved access to a medication that was used in nearly two-thirds of all abortions in the U.S. last year. It’s the court’s first abortion decision since conservative justices overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago. The justices ruled Thursday that abortion opponents lacked the legal right to sue over the federal Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the medication, mifepristone, and the FDA’s subsequent actions to ease access to it. The case had threatened to restrict access to mifepristone across the country, including in states where abortion remains legal. It’s one of two abortion cases at the high court this term.
