Despite Planned Parenthood’s current attempts to blame the federal one-year Medicaid defunding of elective abortion providers (at this time still blocked by a judge’s ruling) for its recent facility closures, staffers have revealed that these “restructuring” plans actually date back years.
But Planned Parenthood continues to play the victim for political gain, as it had already been planning closures and consolidations with a deliberate move toward telehealth in all of its affiliates.
Key Takeaways:
- Planned Parenthood staffers have attested to the corporation’s financial mismanagement, noting that financial woes have never simply been the result of funding cuts.
- Planned Parenthood has struggled with identity issues, funding issues, planned layoffs, and consolidations since 2019 (if not longer), yet it likely finds blaming political leaders and recent (blocked) defunding much easier, as “outrage tends to fuel donations” to the corporation, says the Wall Street Journal.
- For several years, Planned Parenthood on both the national and affiliate levels has struggled in various ways, including staffing shortages, scandals, accusations of discrimination and racism, financial mismanagement, and more.
The Details:
Closures and consolidations in 2024
In 2024, Planned Parenthood of Greater New York (PPGNY) told The New York Times that financial constraints resulted in the closure of four facilities. According to the Daily Gazette, the affiliate cited “financial challenges.” PPGNY also announced that “Amid compounding financial and political challenges,” there would be “a temporary pause to its deep sedation pain management services at the Manhattan Health Center….”
Despite being fully funded under Medicaid, “Last year, it cost the affiliate about $67M to provide healthcare services, but it only received about $36m in insurance reimbursements,” the Guardian claimed.
PPGNY added in January of 2025:
The abortion care ecosystem in New York State is in a crisis. Systemic failures in the U.S. health care system have yielded unprecedented challenges that are forcing many health care providers, including Planned Parenthood of Greater New York, to take serious and immediate cost-saving measures and pursue long-term structural shifts.
Also in 2024:
- Planned Parenthood North Central States announced a consolidation that would “eliminate 36 positions… including 9 current staff and 27 open positions.” They cited “provider shortages, increasing charitable care costs, lagging reimbursement rates that have not kept pace with inflation,” and other reasons.
- Planned Parenthood Keystone cited “challenging times,” as closures were also expected there, according to a news release which claimed that despite the closures, the affiliate’s “Fund for Choice will continue to offer financial support for patients seeking abortion care, whether its travel, lodging, or other financial barriers.”
- Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest (PPPSW) announced the “closing of its Mission Bay Mimi Brien Health Center” as part of PPPSW’s “ongoing efforts to streamline operations and ensure that resources are being used as effectively as possible….”
‘Strategic’ reorganization in 2023
May of 2023, PPFA made a “strategic decision” to restructure and lay off staff at the national level, reportedly shifting those dollars to “build a powerful movement for abortion access at the local and state level.”
“Over one hundred staff at Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA)” were “given layoff notices as part of a broader restructuring of the national organization,” SEIU claimed. The group even condemned PPFA’s “Project North,” claiming it was not “being driven by resource constraints.” Planned Parenthood said at the time that it intended to invest $70 million “in the 49 independent affiliates across the U.S.”
Former Planned Parenthood staffer and author Jessa Crispin accused the corporation of being “more concerned with hobnobbing with the powerful, paying the CEOs of its regional chapters salaries in the mid-six figures, [and] making symbolic gestures… than with providing care for the people who need their services.”
COVID-19 in 2020 provided cover for previously planned layoffs
While Planned Parenthood raked in millions in excess revenue and expanded its abortion market share, staffers at various affiliates claimed the corporation failed to pay them decent wages and unnecessarily furloughed employees. A former staffer even suggested “the [COVID] crisis gave leadership cover to implement layoffs and closures it had already been planning.” Planned Parenthood denied the charge.
The issues preceded fiscal problems created by COVID, but it provided effective cover for the corporation, according to staffers who accused Planned Parenthood of being more concerned with power and profit than anything else.
That year, hundreds of past and present employees signed an open letter accusing the CEO of Planned Parenthood Greater New York (PPGNY) of mistreatment, abuse, racism, and mismanagement of funds. After PPFA fired her, multiple affiliates and staffers came forward with similar accusations.
This was also the same year that Planned Parenthood rolled out its national telehealth program, announcing that Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands would become a national telemedicine hub.
This was likely a strategic decision, not a coincidence.
Planned Parenthood’s 2019 identity crisis
In 2019, cracks in the organization were beginning to show as Planned Parenthood suffered from an identity crisis following the resignation of its “political organizer-in-chief,” Cecile Richards, and other high-ranking leaders. Live Action News documented how vocal and dissatisfied staffers came forward to expose Planned Parenthood’s toxic work environment, culture of intimidation, low wages, and discrimination.
Over the years, multiple Planned Parenthood employees have jumped ship due to long-held dissatisfaction with the corporation. Those who remain have chosen to unionize, and some have exposed the corporation’s abuses, low wages, and affiliates’ failure to offer paid medical leave.
Employees have also filed whistleblower lawsuits and publicly revealed how the corporation discriminates against pregnant employees.
What We’ve Been Hearing:
Ohio closures blamed on funding cuts, though expected closures announced in January
In January of 2025, a Matter News report alleged a number of problems existed at Planned Parenthood Greater Ohio (PPGOH), causing mergers to occur and staffers to unionize. They pointed out that “Staff downsizing often follows a merger.” Staffers reportedly received a letter claiming that if “more staffing changes are needed, they will happen later this spring or early summer.” Summer is now here — and Planned Parenthood is suddenly blaming these foreknown facility closures on taxpayer funding cuts.
“About a year ago, management decided to do some layoffs and close down three health centers. It came out of the blue,” Olivia Oney, the Central Ohio Field Manager for PPGOH, told Matter News. “They kept saying it’s due to finances. Part of that is due to abortion bans, so I can’t blame them entirely, but it’s also due to them not handling finances correctly….”
It should come as no surprise that PPGOH’s virtual center “will remain open,” according to Cleveland.com.
Leadership said changes could come in spring/summer due to merger
After allegedly speaking with current and former Planned Parenthood of Greater Washington and North Idaho (PPGWNI) staffers, Range Media claimed that the affiliate had “[a] track record of poor labor conditions, a deep dive into executive compensation, ghosted donors, an upcoming merger and a 20-year-old discrimination case,” adding that a “letter sent out by PPGWNI also stated that if ‘more staffing changes are needed, they will happen later this spring or early summer.'”
“Staffing woes and other issues” in Nebraska
In May, Flatwater Free Press (FFF) spoke with seven current and former Planned Parenthood employees in Nebraska, who claimed that “out-of-state executives are largely responsible for the staffing woes and other issues. Several said that recent news coverage of the national organization’s broader struggles in clinics across the country resonated with their own experiences.”
Prior to passage of the abortion provider defunding provision, Planned Parenthood staffers told the media outlet that layoffs were coming as the health services team was “restructured.”
Range Media reported that “[e]mployees said turnover has long been an issue at the clinic, but chaotic management over the last year during a major construction project, coupled with unresponsive out-of-state executives” added additional stress. The affiliate’s executives “are disconnected from the reality in Nebraska and clinics generally… [and there is] a lack of transparency and communication around big decisions.”
Mismanagement: Money funneled to legal, political causes
“Planned Parenthood clinics across the country are struggling financially and dealing with high turnover as most of the organization’s fundraised money goes to legal and political causes, a recent New York Times [NYT] investigation found,” FFF wrote.
NYT noted that “Greater New York… laid off and furloughed hundreds of employees. This fall it announced it would cut medical assistants and supervisors, close locations and impose the 20-week abortion limit.”
In February, union labor leaders at Planned Parenthoods claimed some facilities have high “turnover,” some get “no paid maternity leave,” and some receive a “ding from management” if they go over their hours.
Keighlyn Alber, a “medical care assistant” at Planned Parenthood Keystone, told New Labor Forum:
There are outside factors that have impacted our affiliate’s income and functions (e.g., the removal and replacement of Title X funding by Trump and Biden administrations, respectively; or the impact of Covid-19 on patient volume and services), but there may also be some mismanagement of funds.
In 2022, our affiliate received a $7.5 million donation from [philanthropist and novelist] Mackenzie Scott. (She donated a total of $275 million to multiple Planned Parenthood affiliates.) My affiliate has had years to address its financial hardships and, to my knowledge, has still not accounted for where the entirety of Scott’s huge donation went, only pieces of it.
They continue to tell employees that there is a deficit and have not yet ‘opened the books,’ despite union requests to do so.
What’s Happening:
Since the start of this Live Action News series, Planned Parenthood has continued to announce closures — including one in Tyler, Texas. Media outlets unwilling to investigate any deeper than Planned Parenthood’s talking points failed to note how Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas, which operates the Tyler facility, functioned with a $16M deficit in 2023. In addition, as Live Action News documented, the corporation was already consolidating and planning to shift focus toward ‘telehealth’ services as opposed to in-person visits — and Tyler was no exception.
“Prior to the official office closure, the Tyler facility had already limited its services. It was no longer offering in-person appointments and was open just for medication refills, according to its website,” News-Journal.com reported. “Telehealth appointments remain available Monday through Friday.”
Planned Parenthood admitted that its closing facility in Evansville, Indiana, was already seeing a decrease in clients — and nationally, the organization’s clients have been dropping for years. Evansville is set to close in September and is operated by Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaii, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky. The affiliate, which committed 22,450 abortions in 2023 and announced plans to expand so-called ‘gender affirming care’ in 2024, also showed a $3.2 million deficit in its last 990 report.
The Bottom Line:
Despite threatened closures and layoffs, Planned Parenthood currently has numerous job postings online, which include fundraising (philanthropy) positions. The postings indicate that Planned Parenthood is willing to spend tens of thousands in sign-on and retention bonuses for multiple positions.
“What benefits the national organization doesn’t always translate into improvements for affiliates,” the Wall Street Journal reported. “According to a former senior executive at the national office, outrage tends to fuel donations; the more restrictions on abortion, the more it benefits the national office…. Some former staff members describe the national office as bloated, with too many employees making too much money in undefined roles” (emphasis added).
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