Alabama ends effort to cut off funds to Planned Parenthood
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP)
Alabama is ending its effort to cut off Medicaid funds to Planned Parenthood clinics after losing in federal court.
Lawyers for the state and Planned Parenthood Southeast submitted a settlement agreement Monday to a federal judge. In the agreement, the state says Planned Parenthood Southeast has been reinstated as a Medicaid provider.
Planned Parenthood took Alabama to court after Republican Gov. Robert Bentley cut off Medicaid funds to the organization in the wake of undercover videos that anti-abortion activists say show the group's personnel negotiating the sale of fetal organs.
The Alabama clinics do not participate in the donation program.
In the settlement, the state agrees to pay Planned Parenthood's lawyers $51,000 in legal fees. That's about nine times the amount of Medicaid dollars that have gone to the Alabama clinics in the last two years.