May 29, 2020
A group of 65 House Members and 13 Senators have filed an amicus brief with the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, urging them to uphold HHS rules released last year that protect the conscience rights of health care providers. The abortion industry supports forcing all doctors and nurses to assist with abortions, and these rules would protect against that plot.
A fact-sheet of the final rule, which was released in May 2019, states, “This rule gives effect to longstanding laws that broadly protect individuals, health care entities, and providers from discrimination in health care by government or government-funded entities because of the exercise of religious belief or moral conviction. The rule ensures that, among other things, healthcare professionals will not feel compelled to leave the practice of medicine because they decline to participate in actions that violate their conscience such as abortion, sterilization, or assisted suicide.
It also protects the right of diverse faith-based health care institutions to retain their religious beliefs and identity as part of their mission of serving others.”
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals is hearing a challenge to the rule.
The amicus brief states in part, “The Church Amendments, Coats-Snowe Amendment, and the Weldon Amendment all prohibit federally-funded entities from discriminating against healthcare providers who have objections to particular procedures, including abortion, sterilization, and physician-assisted suicide….The Conscience Rule is consistent with the text of the Church Amendments, the Coats-Snowe Amendment, the Weldon Amendment, and the ACA and furthers the statutes’ purpose to protect objectors from discrimination on the basis of their religious or moral convictions.”