Planned Parenthood

Texas officials sued the organization last year in federal court for more than $1.8 billion, claiming it committed Medicaid fraud when it filed reimbursements at a time when the state was seeking to expel it from the program.

In the year since the U.S. Supreme Court's Dobbs v. Jackson decision, Texans have flooded into surrounding states to seek abortion. But experts believe thousands have not been able to access the procedure.

Affiliates filed an emergency lawsuit in an effort to stop the state from blocking 8,000 low-income Texans on Medicaid from receiving care at the health clinics. The state's effort to block them from the program was set to go effect Thursday.

Planned Parenthood officials say patients will have a hard time finding new providers in a short window of time during a pandemic.

Officials with the chain of family-planning clinics say the removal could affect 8,000 people already facing barriers to health care.

The court ruled legal precedent disqualifies Medicaid beneficiaries from taking issue with how a state determines which providers are qualified to be in the health care program.