Planned Parenthood Gets Taxpayer Funding Back and Catholics Rebuke Mamdani Speech - 7/7/26

Planned Parenthood has its federal funding back, but we aren't giving up. I'm Josh Mercer with your Morning LOOPcast. The nation's pro-life leaders raised their voices in protest over the weekend as federal Medicaid reimbursements to Planned Parenthood resumed July 5th after the expiration of a one-year defunding provision enacted in President Donald Trump's 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill. The provision kept roughly $800 million in annual Medicaid reimbursements out of Planned Parenthood's coffers, leading nearly 30 of its... to close down. Pro-life organizations, including CatholicVote, had urged Republican lawmakers to extend Planned Parenthood's defunding.

As I wrote in March of this year, I can think of nothing more egregious for our nation's semi-quincentennial than to reinstate this funding to the largest provider of abortions in the world. Life is a gift, one that many Americans have fought and died for over the last 250 years. Several prominent Democrats are calling on Graham Platner to drop out of the Senate contest in Maine after acting as the president of the United States. ...accusations that Plattner allegedly sexually assaulted a former girlfriend.

Arizona Senator Ruben Gallego and California Congressman Ro Khanna each rescinded their endorsement of Graham Plattner. After New York City Mayor Zoran Mandami delivered an Independence Day speech that framed the nation's history as a story of relentless oppression and injustice, Catholic leaders spoke out to denounce communism and praise America's heritage. Throughout this nation's history, CatholicVote president Kelsey Reinhart stated, The Catholic saint has stood in the face of injustice and true oppression and worked not to blame others and call out other sins alone, but to begin with repentance in their own life and give away his or her life.

To raise others up. That is the hope we need on this America 250. Today, the church honors Blessed Benedict XI, a Dominican friar and talented teacher who served as pope for less than a year at the beginning of the 14th century. Go to zeal.co for the rest of today's loop, and while you're at it, subscribe to get the loop in your inbox every morning. Again, that's zeal.co.