US | Thu Dec 31, 2015 2:41pm EST

Court blocks Utah governor from stopping Planned Parenthood funds

BY ALEX DOBUZINSKIS

A federal appeals court has temporarily blocked Utah's governor from cutting off funding for Planned Parenthood in the state, which he had ordered amid a controversy over the use of fetal tissue from abortions.

A two-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals late on Wednesday reversed a lower court decision that would have let Governor Gary Herbert, a Republican, halt funding to the women's health organization beginning on Jan. 1.

Herbert ordered the cut-off in August, citing secretly recorded videos that anti-abortion groups have said showed Planned Parenthood officials in Texas and other states, but not Utah, discussing the sale of aborted fetal tissue.

Planned Parenthood has said the videos were made to distort the issue of fetal-tissue donations made by the group for scientific research. It says reimbursements received to cover the costs of those donations were neither illegal nor unethical.

Herbert's order would cut off funds that Planned Parenthood uses for sex education and the testing of sexually transmitted diseases. Federal funds cannot be used for abortions, but Planned Parenthood provides abortions with other funds.

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