AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Planned Parenthood said Friday that at least one Texas clinic is getting more time to answer a subpoena from state health investigators that seeks hundreds of pages of staff and patient records.
Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast spokeswoman Rochelle Tafolla said the clinic now has until Oct. 30 to respond to a request for documents going back five years.
The original deadline had been 24 hours.
Investigators with the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) delivered subpoenas to four Planned Parenthood clinics on Thursday.
One of the facilities, in Texas-Mexico border city of Brownsville, does not provide abortions.
The subpoenas arrived days after Texas moved to halt Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood. A similar fight is ongoing in Louisiana.
Planned Parenthood has called the subpoenas a political attack and a fishing expedition.
On Oct. 19, Texas Planned Parenthood affiliates received a letter from HHSC Inspector General Stuart Bowen alerting them to the termination of state Medicaid contracts with them for “numerous acts of misconduct.”
Planned Parenthood in Texas has been the subject of three investigations this year — one called for by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott; another by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton; and the third by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick through the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services.
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