HHS, Red States Want Doctors, Liberal Cities Out of Abortion Row (1)

The Trump administration and over a dozen states are trying to keep a physicians group from stepping into a legal battle that could alter Biden-era privacy protections on abortion records.

Doctors for America and the cities of Madison, Wis., and Columbus, Ohio, can’t intervene in the litigation “based on mere speculation that the Federal Government might, in the future, decide to stop defending the challenged federal regulation,” Missouri said in a Monday court filing.

Missouri’s filing comes in its lawsuit against the US Department of Health of Human Services over a 2024 rule applying Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) privacy protections to abortion and other reproductive services’ records.

The Missouri case was filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.

Issued amid concerns that women in conservative states would be targeted for getting abortions in liberal jurisdictions, the rule is also facing a separate lawsuit brought by Tennessee, Alabama, and thirteen other states, and another from a Texas doctor who convinced a judge to block HHS from enforcing it against her.

On Tuesday, the court in the Texas doctor’s case blocked Doctors for America and the liberal cities from intervening, though it will allow them to file an amicus brief in the case.

The Tennessee case was filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee.

The liberal cities and Doctors for America likewise face opposition from the HHS. Critics of the Trump administration believe that the HHS could ultimately drop out of the case, leaving the cities and physician’s group to take up the battle in the department’s place.

In the Tennessee case, the HHS argued that Doctors for America and the cities “have not identified a direct, substantial, and legally protectable interest that could be impaired absent their intervention.”

The Missouri case is Missouri v. HHS, E.D. Mo., No 4:25-cv-00077, 4/14/25. The Tennessee case is Tennessee v. HHS, E.D. Tenn., No. 3:25-cv-00025, 4/14/25.