The new draconian ban on abortions that Gov. Reynolds signed into law on July 14, and which was stopped by a temporary injunction issued by a state court judge three days later, isn’t the only part of the governor’s anti-abortion agenda that’s currently on hold. The Des Moines Register reported on Thursday that more than a year after Republican lawmakers pushed through a program to generously fund anti-abortion centers, the Reynolds administration still cannot find a contractor to administer that funding program.
The MOMS (More Options for Maternal Support) program was scheduled to begin distributing money on July 1, after an administrator approved a statewide network of so-called “pregnancy resource centers” that work to convince people not to consider abortion as an option during pregnancy. According to a law passed during this year’s session, the program is to be administered by a nonprofit located in Iowa that has “systems and processes in place that have been used for at least three years to successfully manage a statewide network of subcontractors providing pregnancy support services.”
The Iowa Department of Health and Human Services began advertising for bids from nonprofits to administer the program in March, but did not receive “any sufficiently responsive bids.” As a new fiscal year has begun, the department has relaunched its advertising for bids, the Register’s Michelle Ramm reported.
The governor has promoted MOMS as a centerpiece of her maternal health strategy, even though the sort of centers it seeks to support are considered unethical and harmful to those who are pregnant or seeking truthful and accurate information about pregnancy and abortion, by most healthcare professionals.
Better known as “crisis pregnancy centers” (CPCs), the American Academy of Obstetricians and Gynecologists describes the centers as “facilities that represent themselves as legitimate reproductive health care clinics providing care for pregnant people but actually aim to dissuade people from accessing certain types of reproductive health care, including abortion care and even contraceptive options.”
“Staff members at these unregulated and often nonmedical facilities have no legal obligation to provide pregnant people with accurate information and are not subject to HIPAA or required by law to maintain client confidentiality. Many CPCs are affiliated with national organizations that provide funding, support, and training to advance a broadscale antiabortion agenda.”
The academy notes that centers often employ tactics to “intentionally create delays that can leave people unable to access abortion care in their communities, forcing them to continue their pregnancies. This is particularly pronounced in states with gestational age bans.”
At the moment, abortion remains legal in Iowa up to 20 weeks into a pregnancy, but if attorneys for the governor can convince the Iowa Supreme Court to lift the temporary injunction on the new law passed during a one-day special session this month, that time period will be reduced to six weeks in almost all cases.
In 2022, the legislature approved $500,000 for the program. That amount has now risen to $2 million. Ramm notes that according to Iowa Right to Life, there are 55 anti-abortion centers in the state that would likely be eligible for funding under the MOMS program. But without a nonprofit in place to administer the program, none of its funds can be distributed.
“State officials did not disclose why the bids it received failed to meet the criteria for an award,” Ramm reported.
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