Biden rule protecting privacy for abortions likely unlawful, judge rules

(Reuters) - A federal judge in Texas ruled that Democratic President Joe Biden's administration likely exceeded its authority by issuing a rule strengthening privacy protections for women seeking abortions and for patients who receive gender transition treatments.

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk in Amarillo on Sunday agreed to block the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services from enforcing the rule against a Texas doctor who through lawyers at a conservative Christian legal group challenged the regulation as unlawful.

The ruling by Kacsmaryk, who was appointed by Republican President-elect Donald Trump in his first term, issued the preliminary injunction a day before a Monday deadline for the doctor, Carmen Purl and her business to comply with the rule.

"Doctors and states should be able to protect patients from abuse," said Julie Marie Blake of Alliance Defending Freedom, a lawyer for Purl. "The court rightly ruled that this unlawful rule change would have weaponized laws about privacy that have nothing to do with abortion or gender identity."

HHS declined to comment.

Kacsmaryk is best known for having in 2023 suspended the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's approval of the abortion drug mifepristone. The U.S. Supreme Court in June overturned an appeals court's decision that had partially upheld Kacsmaryk's ruling, preserving, for now, access to the medication.

The rule in Purl's case was issued by HHS in April as part of the Biden administration's pledge to take steps to support access to reproductive healthcare after the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court in 2022 overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that made access to abortion a constitutional right nationwide.

It came in response to efforts by authorities in some Republican-led states that ban abortion, including Texas, to restrict out-of-state travel for abortion.

President Joe Biden, a Democrat, said in announcing the rule that no one should have their medical records "used against them, their doctor, or their loved one just because they sought or received lawful reproductive health care."

Liz Taylor, a lawyer for the Center for Reproductive Rights, which supports the rule, in a statement called the lawsuit "shameful" and "part of a larger, concerted effort to scare people from seeking reproductive health care."

"This is about keeping people’s health information private and protected," she said. "But still, anti-abortion extremists want to eviscerate every protection left for patients who need an abortion."

The rule, which is based on HHS's authority to protect patient privacy under the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, prohibits healthcare providers and insurers from giving information about a legal abortion to state law enforcement authorities who are seeking to punish someone in connection with that abortion.

Purl, in a lawsuit filed in October, said the rule could prevent her from reporting abuse of a patient being pressured into getting an abortion or from reporting that a minor was scheduled for gender-affirming treatment in violation of state law.

HHS countered that the rule does not prevent reporting child abuse, since it only forbids disclosing an abortion to authorities who are seeking to impose punishment for it.

But Kacsmaryk said that "even if a more nuanced reading of the 2024 Rule allowed child-abuse reporting to Texas (child protective services), a nonlawyer licensed physician is not equipped to navigate these intersecting legal labyrinths."

(Reporting By Brendan Pierson in New York; Editing by Aurora Ellis)