TV News LIES

A federal judge blocked enforcement of a provision in President Donald Trump's recently enacted tax and spending bill that would deprive Planned Parenthood and its members of Medicaid funding, saying it is likely unconstitutional.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston issued a preliminary injunction on July 28 after finding the law likely violated the Constitution by targeting Planned Parenthood's health centers specifically for punishment for providing abortions.

That provision in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, passed by the Republican-led Congress, denied certain tax-exempt organizations and their affiliates from receiving Medicaid funds if they continue to provide abortions.

The Department of Justice argued that "the bill stops federal subsidies for Big Abortion" and urged Talwani not to let Planned Parenthood and its members "supplant duly enacted legislation with their own policy preferences."

Talwani, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, said the law's text and structure made clear that it was crafted to cover every member of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the parent organization, even if they were not named.re

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Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. signed a controversial recommendation July 23 from a vaccine panel that advised removing thimerosal from all influenza vaccines.

Thimerosal is a preservative that has largely been phased out of U.S. vaccines and has long been targeted by anti-vaccine advocates despite broad scientific consensus on its safety.

The call against thimerosal was first presented by Lyn Redwood, former leader of Children's Health Defense, an anti-vaccine group founded by Kennedy, during a June 26 meeting for the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.

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A federal judge Monday blocked the Trump administration from cutting funding to Planned Parenthood as part of the GOP’s new tax cut and health law.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston granted Planned Parenthood’s request for a temporary injunction while the lawsuit progresses.

Planned Parenthood two weeks ago sued over a provision in the new law that imposes a one-year ban on state Medicaid payments to health care nonprofits that also offer abortions and received more than $800,000 in federal funding in 2023.

Talwani’s ruling still allows the administration to enforce the provision against other providers, and the legislation did not mention Planned Parenthood by name. But the organization says it comprises almost the entirety of the impacted entities.

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Consumers who buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplace will likely face double-digit rate hikes next year.

Insurers plan a median premium increase of 15% for 2026 plans, which would be the largest ACA insurance price hike since 2018, according to a Peterson-KFF Health System Tracker analysis published on July 18.

And many working-age consumers who get their health insurance through the workplace won't be spared, either. Benefits consultant Mercer said more than half of big employers expect to shift a larger share of insurance costs to employees and their families next year by raising deductibles, copays, or out-of-pocket requirements.

KFF said the ACA insurer cited factors such as medical cost inflation, the expiration of tax credits instituted during former President Joe Biden's administration that made plans cheaper, and tariffs on prescription drugs and medical device imports.

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As New Orleans’s bankrupt Roman Catholic archdiocese finalizes a plan to settle 633 clergy abuse claims filed against it, the church’s investors are arguing in US bankruptcy court that about half of those survivors could have their claims thrown out.

Church officials said on Wednesday they would not necessarily seek that, though the eligibility of claims will be determined by a court-appointed examiner. If the investors’ arguments prevail, it could have major effects on whether the US’s second-oldest Catholic archdiocese settles its expensive, five-year-old bankruptcy case – or if victims of abuse by its clergy will pursue their claims individually in civil court.

Meanwhile, documents filed in court on Tuesday outlined how the church has agreed to pay at least $180m into a settlement trust, with the total growing to between $210m and $235m if a number of affordable apartment complexes owned by a church affiliate can be sold.

After the eligible claimants are determined, they will get to vote to approve or reject the settlement by 29 October.

If two-thirds of the voting claimants do not approve the settlement, Judge Meredith Grabill has said she will have no choice but to throw the church out of bankruptcy.

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Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a staunch vaccine supporter, said he was “heartbroken” after hearing parents recount how their once-healthy children were injured or killed by vaccines.

The parents’ testimony, delivered during Tuesday’s U.S. Senate hearing, “Voices of the Vaccine Injured,” did little to sway Blumenthal from his belief that vaccines are “safe and effective” — but the gut-wrenching stories did lead the senator to suggest he may be willing to look into the issue of whether pharmaceutical companies should be held liable for injuries caused by their products.

“Maybe we ought to look at this system,” said Blumenthal, referring to the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986, which established a government compensation program for people injured by vaccines while granting legal immunity to vaccine makers.

Since 1986, the only recourse parents have had if their child was injured is to file a claim through the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) — a bureaucratic labyrinth that rejects nearly half of all claims.

Blumenthal, ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which held the hearing, said the parents’ testimony “makes me want to do something.”

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