Earlier today, in response to criticism from Catholic groups, the White House altered its regulation requiring employers and insurers to provide no-cost contraception coverage as part of their health care plans. Churches and religious nonprofits that primarily employ people of the same faith are still exempt from the requirement, but now religiously affiliated colleges, universities, and hospitals that wish to avoid providing birth control can do so. Their employees will still receive contraception coverage at no additional cost sharing directly from the insurer.

But Republicans and some conservative Catholic groups are not satisfied with the accommodation and hope to use their false claim of “religious persecution” to deny women access to preventive health services. Despite Obama’s decision to shield nonprofit religious institutions from offering birth control benefits, next week Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) is expected to offer an amendment that would permit any employer or insurance plan to exclude any health service, no matter how essential, from coverage if they morally object to it:

(6) RESPECTING RIGHTS OF CONSCIENCE WITH REGARD TO SPECIFIC ITEMS OR SERVICES —

“(A) FOR HEALTH PLANS. — A health plan shall not be considered to have failed to provide the essential health benefits package described in subsection (a) (or preventive health services described in section 2713 of the Public Health Services Act), to fail to be a qualified health plan, or to fail to fulfill any other requirement under this title on the basis that it declines to provide coverage of specific items or services because —

“(i) providing coverage (or, in the case of a sponsor of a group health plan, paying for coverage) of such specific items or services is contrary to the religious beliefs or moral convictions of the sponsor, issuer, or other entity offering the plan; or

“(ii) such coverage (in the case of individual coverage) is contrary to the religious beliefs or moral convictions of the purchaser or beneficiary of the coverage.

Under the measure, an insurer or an employer would be able to claim a moral or religious objection to covering HIV/AIDS screenings, Type 2 Diabetes treatments, cancer tests or anything else they deem inappropriate or the result of an “unhealthy” or “immoral” lifestyle. Similarly, a health plan could refuse to cover mental health care on the grounds that the plan believes that psychiatric problems should be treated with prayer.

Individuals too can opt out of coverage if it is contrary to their religious or moral beliefs, radically undermining “the basic principle of insurance, which involves pooling the risks for all possible medical needs of all enrollees.” As the National Women’s Law Center explains, Blunt’s language is vague enough that “insurers may be able to sell plans that do not cover services required by the new health care law to an entire market because one individual objects, so all consumers in a market lose their right to coverage of the full range of critical health services.” As a result, a man “purchasing an insurance plan offered to women and men could object to maternity coverage, so the plan would not have to cover it, even though such coverage is required as part of the essential health benefits.”

Read the full amendment here.

WASHINGTON, DC — Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) shed his usual placid demeanor when discussing birth control for low-income women on Friday, telling ThinkProgress that “not one” woman doesn’t have access to contraception in the United States.

Price, who serves as the fifth ranking Republican in the House, made the comments to ThinkProgress this morning at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. Like virtually all Republicans in Congress, he opposes the recent Obama administration rule requiring employers and insurers to offer birth control at no cost.

We asked Price, who is a medical doctor by trade, what he would say to low-income women who can’t afford birth control if it’s not covered by their insurance policies. Price responded by denying their very existence. “Bring me one woman who has been left behind,” he demanded. “Bring me one. There’s not one”:

KEYES: Obviously one of the main sticking points is whether or not contraception coverage is going to be covered health insurance plans and at hospitals and whether or not they’re going to be able to pay for it, especially for low-income women. Where do we leave these women if this rule is rescinded?

PRICE: Bring me one woman who has been left behind. Bring me one. There’s not one. The fact of the matter is, this is a trampling of religious freedom and religious liberty in this country. The president does not have the power to say that your First Amendment rights go away. That’s wrong.

In fact, there are tens of millions of women in the United States who have struggled to afford or don’t have access to contraception. A recent Hart Research survey found that one in three women voters have struggled to afford prescription birth control, including 55 percent of young women aged 18 to 34.

Fortunately, the Obama administration has moved to help these women by requiring insurers to provide birth control at no charge, a move that Price vehemently opposes.

Senior administration officials announced early this morning that President Obama will announce a new “accommodation” for religious liberties in the rule requiring all employers to offer contraception coverage without additional cost sharing. Under the new policy, “all women will still have access to free preventive care, including contraception,” no matter where they work. However, if a nonprofit religiously affiliated organization like a Catholic college or hospital objects to offering birth control, the insurance company will be required to provide the coverage free of charge and the employer will not pay for it. Sister Carol Keehan, President of the US Catholic Health Association and Planned Parenthood head Cecile Richards support the compromise, the administration officials said.

Significantly, unlike the Hawaii model, religiously affiliated organizations will not have to refer employees to contraception coverage. Instead, the same insurer that provides insurance to the employer, will be offering contraception coverage to the employee directly. Insurance companies will be able to deliver birth control at no additional charge because the cost of contraception is far less than the costs associated with an unwanted pregnancy, the administration official explained. Therefore, “there is no extra premium” associated with the service.

The new rule means that contraception without cost sharing will be available starting Aug. 1, 2012.

Responding to growing criticism from Catholic institutions and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, the White House is expected to announce a compromise of its new rule requiring employers and insurers to provide contraception benefits without additional cost sharing. While the details are still sketchy, early reports indicate that the modification may be similar on the so-called “Hawaii model,” where employers must include contraception in their employee insurance plans, but can invoke a refusal clause to exclude such services. Companies that opt-out of offering contraception coverage, inform their employees of their decision and refer them to a provider of contraception insurance. “Employees can then purchase contraception coverage from their insurer at a cost no higher than the enrollee’s pro-rata share of the price the employer would have paid had it not exercised the religious exemption.”

But this so-called “contraception rider” modification is already not sitting well with Catholics, who have been the most vocal opponents of the administration’s rule. “The concept…is you don’t have to do this, you just have to refer people to this. That seems to me like saying in your schools, ‘we’re not going to have pornographic websites in our websites, but we’re going to have to have referrals to where the kids can go to find those websites,” Cardinal Donald Wuerl told MSNBC’s Morning Joe just minutes after news of the compromise broke early Friday morning. “I don’t think it makes sense,” he said and went on to dismiss the fact that some women receive birth control prescriptions to treat health ailments, like ovarian cancer, that have nothing to do with pregnancy:

WUERL: Our concern is our basic freedom and I’m not sure it makes sense to say how about if we compromise away parts of your freedom? How about if this part is acceptable to us and this part isn’t? I would want to see exactly what we’re being offered. [...]

SAM STEIN (HUFFFINGTON POST): What would you tell someone like that who actually requires birth control for her own health?

WUERL: The question of access is very different from the question of freedom. Access to contraceptives, access to sterilization, access even to abortifations is a reality today. You can purchase these things. you can get these things. I’m told it’s not quite as expensive to go in and buy contraceptives….but to say that because we want access you must lose your freedom… the question is freedom.

Watch a compilation:

Bishop William Lori, chair of the U.S. bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Religious Liberty, has also described the Hawaii model as a failure, arguing that it forces Catholic institutions to make a referral “to a service that it regards as intrinsically immoral.”

“There has been a lot of talk in the last couple days about compromise, but it sounds to us like a way to turn down the heat, to placate people without doing anything in particular,” Anthony Picarello, general counsel for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said in USA Today. “We’re not going to do anything until this is fixed,” and suggested that that would require removing the provision from the health care law altogether.

Republicans are also skeptical of the yet-to-be announced accommodation. As Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) tweeted out this morning, “Unless Pres Obama is reversing the #HHSmandate entirely, there’s no “compromise” when it comes to Americans’ religious freedom.”

Rick Santorum has been outspoken about his Catholic faith on the campaign trail, explaining how his faith and personal values have influenced his political positions. But at a campaign event at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma today, Santorum had trouble rationalizing how he reconciled his opposition to health care reform with the Catholic Church’s support of the plan. A questioner asked Santorum, “With you lining up with the Catholic faith on so many issues, why not the Catholic Church on health care since it is a value and a human right?”

Santorum offered a rambling answer, first saying that church’s teachings had shaped his life and then insisting that he also has to consider reason as a politician. “I always say if your faith is true and your reason is right, then you’ll end up in the right place,” he said. “And of course why would God create something where reason would bring you one place and your faith would bring you another if your faith is true?” And as a public official, he said, he had an obligation to talk to people who share his faith and those who don’t:

My conscience was formed as a result of my life experiences and primarily through faith and through the moral values I was taught through the teachings within the Bible and the church. Yes, I bring that to the table. That’s who I am. [...]

I look at the Affordable Care Act and say, both from the standpoint of faith, do I believe that people should have the opportunity to purchase health care? Yes. Do I believe that it is the right that the government should impose and control? No. It’s one thing to say that people have a right to access of care. It’s another to say that the government should be the implementer of that. And something tells me that government is the least effective tool to make that the best possible care.

Watch it:

Of course, Pope Benedict XVI has called health care an “inalienable right,” and added that it is the “moral responsibility of nations to guarantee access to health care for all of their citizens, regardless of social and economic status or their ability to pay.” The Catholic Health Association supported the Affordable Care Act, and during the debate about health care reform, Catholic nuns broke with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to support it. But Santorum will continue to twist the logic to fit the position he wants to support.