Notre Dame Sued Over Birth Control Coverage

A group of organizations filed suit against the Trump administration and the University of Notre Dame over changes to birth control coverage for students and employees.

A group of students and staff called Irish 4 Reproductive Health are suing because the University will stop offering co-pay free birth control starting July 1.

Previously those under the university’s health plans were able to get coverage through a supplemental plan. Now the University has dropped coverage for some methods and will charge co-pays for others, citing the expansion of the religious and moral exemptions to the ACA made by the Trump administration last fall.

Michelle Banker is senior council at the National Women’s Law Center and one of the lawyers on the suit.

“This lawsuit is different because it’s specifically challenging this unlawful backroom deal that the administration entered into with Notre Dame where they basically conspired to take away the rights of people and their health insurance plans to obtain contraceptive coverage that they’re entitled to under the law,” Banker says.

Banker says other lawsuits are blocking the change to the moral and religious exemptions in federal court, and it’s illegal for Notre Dame to drop the coverage.

Notre Dame said in statement "The assertions on the face of it are maliciously and preposterously false."

The University would not comment further.