Washington state defeats church's appeal over healthcare coverage for abortion

In a 2-1 decision, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the Cedar Park Assembly of God of Kirkland, Washington failed to show that the state's Reproductive Parity Act of 2018 targeted religious conduct or otherwise reflected "hostility" toward religion.

On the same grounds, the court also ​rejected the Pentecostal church's challenge to Washington's conscientious objection statute, a 1995 law that excuses employers such as Cedar Park from ​purchasing coverage for services they oppose on religious or moral grounds, but requires health carriers to tell enrollees ⁠how to obtain such services.

Dozens of conservative entities and Republican attorneys general of 18 U.S. states sided with Cedar Park, which according to ​the decision provides health insurance to about 140 people and has a sincere religious belief that abortion is sinful. “We are disappointed," said Cedar Park's lawyer ​Rory Gray, senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom.

"No church should be forced to be complicit in abortion, but the state has gone out of its way to force churches to cover and pay for abortions through theA spokesperson for Washington Attorney General Nick Brown's office welcomed the ​decision, saying the office was "proud to defend Washington state law," protecting access to reproductive healthcare while also safeguarding Washingtonians' religious and conscience rights.

Cedar ​Park claimed that Washington's laws violated its First Amendment constitutional right to the free exercise of religion. It said the laws worked together to undermine its religious ‌objections to ⁠abortion, arguing that even if it declined to purchase abortion coverage, it facilitated abortion indirectly because the state required that employees be.

It sued in 2019, when Kaiser Permanente began requiring abortion coverage in its group plan. MAJORITY FINDS RATIONAL BASISWriting for the majority, Circuit Judge Susan Graber said the Parity Act was rationally related to Washington's interest in ensuring improved access for insured residents to reproductive health care, ​while preserving everyone's fundamental right to ​exercise their religious beliefs and ⁠conscience.