Kansas Paid Outside Law Firms $899,000 In Losing Effort To Defund Planned Parenthood [View all]

A day after Kansas notified Planned Parenthood in May 2016 that it would cut off its participation in Medicaid, the nonprofit group sued to block the move.

So Kansas hired three high-powered East Coast law firms to defend it in a case that would slog on for nearly three years before Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s administration agreed to drop the termination effort in April.

The case dates back to the administration of Gov. Sam Brownback, a Republican who vowed to defund Planned Parenthood after he accused it of profiting from the sale of fetal tissue.

The state’s legal defense cost taxpayers at least $899,000, according to records obtained by KCUR through the Kansas Open Records Act.

Read more: https://www.kcur.org/post/kansas-paid-outside-law-firms-899000-losing-effort-defund-planned-parenthood#stream/0