Federal judge blocks Trump administration's broad birth control mandate exemptions Federal judge blocks Trump administra [View all]
Source: The Hill
08/14/25 1:12 PM ET
The Trump administration’s religious and moral carve-outs to an ObamaCare requirement that all employer health plans cover contraception at no cost were blocked on Wednesday by a federal judge. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone in Philadelphia issued a summary judgment that the rules were arbitrary, capricious and an overreach of the authority of the agencies that wrote them in 2017.
Under the rules, essentially any for-profit or nonprofit employer or insurer was allowed to exempt themselves from following the birth control mandate on moral and religious grounds. The rules also let publicly traded companies obtain a religious exemption, but not a moral one.
The Affordable Care Act required employer health plans to cover at least one of 18 forms of birth control approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
Religious groups and employers sued, and the Supreme Court in 2014 ruled 5-4 that the contraceptive mandate violated the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) rights of closely held corporations whose owners had religious objections. Subsequent agency actions tried to find a balance, but the Trump administration in 2017 issued a blanket exemption. The rules didn’t require employers to apply for an exemption because the administration said that would be a violation of their religious rights.
Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5452415-trump-contraception-exemption-blocked/
Link to RULING (PDF) - https://litigationtracker.law.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Commonwealth-of-Pennsylvania_2025.08.13_OPINION-AND-ORDER.pdf
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