(LifeSiteNews) — A prominent legal group told a federal court that Planned Parenthood has no “constitutional right” to taxpayer dollars.

The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) filed an amicus brief in the District Court for the District of Massachusetts, urging the court to allow Congress to block Medicaid payments to entities that commit abortions. The case is officially called Planned Parenthood v. Kennedy, as the named defendant is Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Last week, an activist federal judge named Indira Talwani quickly issued a temporary restraining order blocking the defunding of Planned Parenthood. Congress included the one-year defunding in its passage of a budget reconciliation bill signed on July 4 by President Donald Trump. The defunding includes exceptions for alleged “medical” reasons, although direct abortion is never medically necessary, as experts have affirmed.

However, Judge Talwani erred, according to the ACLJ. President Barack Obama appointed her to the federal bench.

Planned Parenthood’s lawsuit is “an assault on the separation of powers and Congress’s authority to choose not to fund abortion or abortion providers,” the July 11 filing states.

The brief details how federal courts, including the Supreme Court, have consistently upheld prohibitions on taxpayer-funded abortions and indirect subsidies to abortion vendors. These rulings occurred even before the reversal of Roe v. Wade.

The ACLJ says “there is no constitutional right to government subsidies for abortion or abortion providers” and cites case law from 1977, 1980, and 1991. Furthermore, the Supreme Court upheld just last month that Planned Parenthood and individual clients could not sue South Carolina for excluding abortion vendors from the state’s Medicaid system.

Congress is within its power to place limits on who receives taxpayer funding, the ACLJ maintains. To force it to fund something it did not authorize would be to violate the separation of powers. “Congress’s decision reflects a broader policy judgment shared by governments at multiple levels,” the brief states. “Many states have reached similar conclusions about funding abortion providers, based on their own assessments of the competing priorities in healthcare spending of preserving and promoting life.”

In its lawsuit, Planned Parenthood argues that the Hyde Amendment prohibits taxpayer funding for abortions already. However, as the American Center for Law and Justice points out, money is fungible.

The brief states:

Money Planned Parenthood receives from Medicaid to subsidize one service is money that it can then utilize to perform another action, namely, abortion. When the government provides funding to an organization for permitted activities, those funds free up other resources that can be redirected toward activities the government prefers not to support. Congress has consistently sought to ensure that federal dollars do not indirectly subsidize abortions, even when not directly funding them. The constitutional question is not whether this indirect effect exists, but whether Congress may reasonably act to prevent it.

The lawsuit further details how Planned Parenthood is seeking to undermine the rule of law. “Plaintiffs demand the extraordinary remedy of forcing Congress to spend taxpayer dollars to subsidize Planned Parenthood,” the brief states. “This lawsuit presents an extreme attempt to usurp Congress’s constitutional authority to control the power of the purse.”

The brief ends with laying out the consequences of further judicial activism: “If courts could force Congress to fund organizations dissatisfied with its spending decisions, every budgetary choice would risk becoming a constitutional issue.”

Legal experts question Planned Parenthood lawsuit, judge’s ruling

While the court case continues, other legal experts have raised questions about the strength of Planned Parenthood’s case.

South Texas College of Law Professor Josh Blackman questioned the speed at which Judge Talwani issued the temporary restraining order. “Lower court judges are misbehaving,” Blackman, a legal expert, wrote in his commentary.

He said Talwani “rushed” to file her restraining order and did not include a proper analysis required to issue such injunctions.

Blackman also highlighted a previous quote from Talwani in 2023 where she said she could not process filings in a day.

Legal scholar Tom Jipping with the Heritage Foundation raised similar concerns. “What you have here is Congress exercising its explicit constitutional authority to make spending decisions, and you have a district judge arguably trying to exercise power she doesn’t have to force Congress to change,” Jipping, a former U.S. Senate counsel, told Fox News.

“This was a pretty egregious judicial usurpation of legislative power,” Republican Senator Mike Lee, an attorney, also said.

National Review commentator Dan McLaughlin called the ruling “lawless and dangerous” and “a raw exercise of power.”

Meanwhile pro-life leaders shared their own concerns about the legal issues. Students for Life Action President Kristan Hawkins, for example, criticized the ruling as a “lawless power grab” and urged Attorney General Pam Bondi to intervene.

“Every single day this order stands, Planned Parenthood rakes in $1.5 million more of our taxpayer dollars.”