Republican lawmakers are advancing a bill that would prohibit the state from providing public funding to facilities and clinics that perform or promote abortions.

Arizona already doesn’t allow public funding for most abortions except for emergencies, but House Bill 2547 would expand the law to prevent the state from entering into a contract or providing grants to any person or facility that provides or advises clients to seek an abortion.

The bill passed the Senate Government Committee along party lines on March 19 and is awaiting a hearing from the Senate Rules Committee.

Supporters of the bill acknowledged that voters approved Proposition 139 last fall, which enshrines the right to an abortion in the state Constitution. But they say taxpayer money shouldn’t fund facilities that advertise the procedure as a viable option for unwanted pregnancies.

“The crux of this whole issue is whether the taxpayer should be paying for that promotion,” said U.S. Rep Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., who testified at the March 19 hearing in support of the bill. “So if you’re defining promotion as someone going in and being referred to a specific specialist for medical care, in this instance, there is no rationale that says that the public should have to be paying for that,” the congressman said.

Medical professionals and abortion-rights groups faulted the bill for attempting to circumvent Proposition 139. They also said the legislation could limit access to health care options, affect low income people who rely on publicly funded clinics for reproductive health care and potentially violate the First Amendment.

“If a doctor refers someone to get an abortion or even talks about it as an option, then now they can’t receive Medicaid reimbursement for services,” said Jeanne Woodbury, a lobbyist for Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona. “If an emergency room saves someone’s life by providing an emergency abortion, that whole hospital could be defunded.”

That could lead to the closure of facilities that provide abortions and other health care.

“It’s a way to sort of literally drain an abortion provider of all public funds, such that their operational status remains or really becomes contentious,” said James G. Hodge Jr., the Peter Kiewit Foundation professor of law at Arizona State University, and director of the ASU’s Center for Public Health Law and Policy at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law. 

The legislation is reflective of an ongoing national trend as several states across the country have sought to restrict abortions and defund organizations such as Planned Parenthood.

States have been looking to limit abortions for decades but the efforts have intensified since the U.S. Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade and withdrew the constitutional right to an abortion in 2022, Hodge said.

“During the era of which we’ve seen with the Dobbs case in 2022 and the … Supreme Court withdrawal of that constitutional right to abortion, we have definitely seen an uptake of additional states, like Arizona, seeking to fully restrict considerable use of public funds for any such provision,” he said.

According to data compiled by Temple University’s Center for Public Health Law Research, 37 states currently have laws that restrict the use of public resources for abortions to varying degrees. Most of the state policies mirror federal law restricting funding for abortions except for emergencies.

However, the proposed Arizona bill is following the lead of a similar South Carolina law that’s currently being debated in the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court on April 2 was scheduled to hear oral arguments for Medina v. Planned Parenthood, which could determine whether South Carolina can exclude Planned Parenthood from receiving state Medicaid funding. In 2018, that state’s governor, Henry McMaster, ordered its Department of Health and Human Services to terminate Medicaid enrollment agreements with clinics providing abortion services.

“The outcome of that could dictate what happens here with this House bill,” Hodge said.

Arizona Abortion-rights groups are hoping the bill doesn’t make it that far.

In a statement released last month after the Senate Government Committee approved the bill, Erika Mach, chief external affairs officer of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona, said, “It attempts to silence and gut funding for Planned Parenthood Arizona and other health care organizations just for providing abortion care – while in actuality, defunding essential, preventive reproductive health care, like birth control, cancer screenings, wellness exams, STI testing and treatment, and more. 

Governor Hobbs must veto this extremist legislation and put a stop to this dangerous effort to continue to chip away at our constitutional right to abortion.”