The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have two major objections to the deal. Bishops: Deal 'unacceptable'

Hours after calling the Obama administration's contraceptives compromise a "first step," the Catholic bishops said Friday night they have "two serious objections" to the new policy and will fight its enactment.

First, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said the administration’s plan still includes a “nationwide mandate of insurance coverage of sterilization and contraception, including some abortifacients.”


“This is both unsupported in the law and remains a grave moral concern,” the bishops said in their statement. “We cannot fail to reiterate this, even as so many would focus exclusively on the question of religious liberty.

And while President Barack Obama’s new plan allows religious-affiliated employers to refrain from paying for contraceptive coverage — insurers would be obligated to provide the coverage for free — the bishops said the change doesn’t go far enough.

“It would still mandate that all insurers must include coverage for the objectionable services in all the policies they would write,” the bishops said. “At this point, it would appear that self-insuring religious employers, and religious insurance companies, are not exempt from this mandate.”

The bishops said the president’s plan will require “careful moral analysis” and may still change.

But they made it clear that a “lack of clear protection for key stakeholders — for self-insured religious employers; for religious and secular for-profit employers; for secular non-profit employers; for religious insurers; and for individuals — is unacceptable and must be corrected. And in the case where the employee and insurer agree to add the objectionable coverage, that coverage is still provided as a part of the objecting employer's plan, financed in the same way as the rest of the coverage offered by the objecting employer. This, too, raises serious moral concerns.”

A senior administration official told POLITICO on Saturday that the White House didn't expect to win the support of the bishops with Friday's updated policy. Instead, the official said, the administration was focused on achieving a balance of respecting religious beliefs and ensuring women had access to preventive services.

The Obama administration’s original policy exempted only churches from requirements to cover contraceptives in their health insurance plans. After heavy criticism from the bishops and others, the White House released its new plan Friday morning. The bishops said they were first notified of the plan Friday morning, shortly before Obama's announcement.

A poll conducted Friday evening by Public Policy Polling found that 57 percent of Catholic voters support the new policy and 34 percent oppose it. The compromise fares about as well with politically independent Catholics: 56 percent support it and 38 percent oppose it. The poll was conducted for the Coalition to Protect Women's Health Care.

This article first appeared on POLITICO Pro at 7:45 a.m. on February 11, 2012.

