Education

Obamacare Contraception Mandate Causes Christian College To End Student Health Insurance

Font Size:

On Friday, Wheaton College will stop providing student health insurance.

Officials at the evangelical Christian liberal arts college in the suburbs west of Chicago made the decision because they refuse — for religious reasons — to abide by the contraception provisions mandated under the Affordable Care Act, reports Crain’s Chicago Business.

Student health insurance expires on July 31. Students seeking health insurance options for the 2015-16 school year will have to look to private commercial insurers or to HealthCare.gov, the federal Obamacare exchange, for coverage.

“We regret that we were not able to provide earlier notice of this significant change, which affects roughly a quarter of our student body,” Paul Chelsen, Wheaton’s vice president for student development, wrote in a July 22 statement obtained by Crain’s. “The college is considering all of its options and will explore the possibility of again offering a (student health insurance plan) in the future if circumstances allow us to do so in good conscience.”

The evangelical school has been involved in significant legal action against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

On July 1, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit denied Wheaton’s request for a preliminary injunction.

The decision to end Wheaton’s student insurance program appears to be related to this denial.

The Obamacare birth control mandate originally required employers to provide 20 types of contraception to employees at no cost, but the administration offered an accommodation in response to outcry from religious employers that oppose certain types of birth control.

The Supreme Court took Obamcare opponents’ side in previous cases, causing the Obama administration to back off its prized mandate. However, Wheaton and other religious colleges have remained unsatisfied. (RELATED: Supreme Court Grants Christian College Injunction Over Obamacare Religious Exemption)

The actual lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is still pending.

A Chicago Tribune columnist, Heidi Stevens, criticized Wheaton’s decision to cancel all student insurance.

“I would argue, it’s a violation of the trust” which “students and their parents placed in Wheaton College when they chose to invest their time and money there,” Stevens, who holds a prestigious bachelor’s degree in journalism from Eastern Illinois University, wrote.

U.S. News ranks Wheaton College as America’s 56th-best national liberal arts college.

Wheaton’s motto is “For Christ and His Kingdom.”

Follow Eric on TwitterLike Eric on Facebook. Send education-related story tips to erico@dailycaller.com.

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel