California to invest $140 million in Planned Parenthood

[Thiệu Ngô]

Newsom and Bonta announce investments while 21 state attorneys general fight federal defunding effort

By Madeline Shannon

California Gov. Gavin Newsom this week announced $140 million in investments for Planned Parenthood while its Medicaid funding is on the chopping block.

The state funding for the organization is meant to preserve access to what Newsom said were life-saving critical health care centers.

“California is a reproductive freedom state, and this latest investment continues to show our belief in protecting access to essential health care in times of distress,” Newsom said Thursday in a news release from his office. “Trump’s efforts to defund Planned Parenthood put all our communities at risk as people seek basic health care from these community providers.”

The move comes the same week that California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed an amicus brief alongside 20 other state attorneys general to stop the Trump administration’s effort to defund Planned Parenthood by stripping the organization’s Medicaid funding.

The amicus brief, which can be filed in support of one party or another in a court case, was also meant to be a show of support for Planned Parenthood in its case against the Trump administration, which included the provision to defund the well-known reproductive health care provider in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

“The Trump Administration’s assault on healthcare, which includes reproductive care, knows no bounds,” Bonta said in a news release. “We cannot lose sight of how disastrous the Defund Provision will be for the loss of vital healthcare services that Planned Parenthood and other health centers provide.”

The defund provision that seeks to strip Planned Parenthood of its Medicaid funding aims to block that funding for organizations that provide essential medical services like cancer screenings, birth control, testing for sexually-transmitted infections and wellness exams provided by what the bill calls “prohibited entities.”

The definition of "prohibited entities" sets out criteria that identifies solely Planned Parenthood, Bonta’s office said. The apparent targeting of Planned Parenthood fulfills a longtime goal of Republican politicians of cutting funding to Planned Parenthood in an effort to punish the organization, Bonta’s office alleges.

According to a report by health policy organization KFF, Medicaid and Title X, a Title X family planning program operated by the federal government reimburses Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide for a number of services. These include contraceptive care, pregnancy testing, testing for sexually-transmitted infections and other gynecological health services to low-income and uninsured people.

“A loss of Medicaid and Title X funding will likely mean that affected Planned Parenthood clinics will have fewer resources to serve low-income clients, could have longer wait times for those who seek care, and low-income patients could face limits to contraceptive access and STI screening,” the report states.

A number of other states have made moves to limit or eliminate federal funding to Planned Parenthood, including North Carolina and Wisconsin, while other states have pushed to protect funding, like Colorado.

The push by the Trump administration to cut Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood is already having effects. Some locations have closed, while others have curtailed services in response to funding cuts already coming down the pike, according to Bonta’s office.

“In California, we have worked for years to protect a woman’s right to access comprehensive reproductive medical care by signing into law protections for care providers, increasing patients’ right to medical privacy, and expanding access to contraception," Senate President Pro Tem-Elect Monique Limón, D-Santa Barbara, said in a press release issued Thursday. "While women continue to face constitutional attacks on their reproductive freedom, California is and will always be committed to full reproductive medical care."

Some legislators disagreed with Newsom's move to funnel state money to Planned Parenthood, with Sen. Maria Alvarado-Gil, R-Modesto, calling it "a display of misplaced priorities."

"Such decisions underscore Newsom's distorted values, funneling vast sums to ideological allies while abandoning vulnerable communities to life-threatening gaps in emergency care," Alvarado-Gil said in an emailed statement to The Center Square. "And let’s not pretend this is not political payback to Planned Parenthood for their robust support in his aggressive redistricting push which went all in with millions in funding, grassroots mobilization, and advocacy.”

The amicus brief Bonta and the other state attorneys general filed this week follows a lawsuit Bonta and 23 other states filed against the Trump Administration in July 2025 over the same defund provision targeting Planned Parenthood. The case is currently pending in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts.

“The Planned Parenthood affiliates in California are grateful to Governor Newsom and our allies in the Legislature for taking this necessary step to keep Planned Parenthood health centers open and able to provide critical services as they weather the impacts of the federal defund,” said Jodi Hicks, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, in a press release.