Iowa AG Holding Up Emergency Contraception Funding

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The new Iowa AG is at it again

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The Iowa attorney general’s office said it is still working on an audit of its victim services that has held up emergency contraception funding for victims of sexual assault despite having a completed draft in hand.

Attorney General Brenna Bird, a Republican, paused the funding while awaiting the results of the audit to decide whether to continue those payments. Her office said the audit, which Bird announced when she took office 14 months ago, is in its “final stages” and a report would be released soon.

The policy under her Democratic predecessor, Tom Miller, had been to partially cover the cost of contraception for sexual assault victims. In rare cases, the cost of abortion for sexual assault victims was also covered, Miller’s victim assistance division director, Sandi Tibbetts Murphy, told the Des Moines Register last year.

“As a part of her top-down, bottom-up audit of victim assistance, Attorney General Bird is carefully evaluating whether this is an appropriate use of public funds,” said Alyssa Brouillet, Bird’s communications director. “Until that review is complete, payment of these pending claims will be delayed.”