Threats to Title X Funding Harm Independent Clinics and Their Patients

On April 1, the Trump administration withheld over $65 million in funding for Title X, the federal program that provides reproductive health care to uninsured, underinsured, and low-income people. Since then, clinics have responded to the administration’s extensive documentation requests and a lawsuit has been filed by NFPRHA and the ACLU. A month later, we’re in a holding pattern as we wait for funds to be released or denied to trusted community health centers across the country.

The vast majority of clinics impacted by the funding freeze are independent, community-based clinics. This funding freeze affects an estimated 870 clinics in 22 states, impacting nearly 850,000 patients. The Trump administration is putting people’s health and lives at risk, withholding funds from clinics it deems to be working towards racial and gender-based equity. Family planning and preventive care are not political bargaining chips, and hateful ideology has no place in the exam room.

Independent clinics are already under-resourced and under constant threat. Withholding these funds could force clinics to close or scale back services, making it impossible for people with the fewest resources to get any care at all. We deserve better: we should be able to get affordable, dignified care we need from providers we trust.

Threatening Title X funding is an attack on community-based clinics and everyone who relies on them. Title X provides poor, uninsured, and underserved communities with affordable reproductive health care — including birth control, STI testing, cancer screenings, and wellness check-ups. Title X clinics are also crucial health care sites: for many people, they are the only place they get medical care. Cutting Title X funding would result in further dismantling an already under-resourced public health system and worsening health inequities.

This is happening while the United States is in the midst of a reproductive health crisis. Abortion is banned in 12 states and severely restricted in many more. Maternal health outcomes in the U.S. are some of the worst in the world. Attacks on health care for trans people continue, as do threats to Medicaid and Medicare. It was never just about abortion: it’s about punishment, power, and control — all at the cost of our health and our lives.

The chaos, confusion, and overwhelm is the point — but accurate information is out there, and there are ways to help.

• If you need care, find your local clinic. Search Bedsider for a list of sexual and reproductive health centers, and go to ineedanA.com for a list of abortion providers.

If you want to help, independent clinics need your support desperately. Support your local clinic:

• Donate to Keep Our Clinics: Indie providers are working under increasingly hostile conditions: funding continues to be cut, while extremists are emboldened to harass and harm them. Every dollar donated to Keep Our Clinics goes directly to indie clinics in the U.S.
• Become a patient: many independent clinics offer a range of health care services — if a clinic near you offers services you need, consider getting your care there.
• Volunteer or work with a clinic: clinics need everything from web design to landscaping to patient escorts. Find and connect with your local indie to find out how you can get involved.

This administration is determined to close clinics and keep patients from getting basic, essential health services. But we are not powerless, and we will not back down.

Community care is radical and essential, and independent clinics are worth fighting for. Join Abortion Care Network in supporting, celebrating, and showing up for indies. Our lives and our care depend on it.