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AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas officials are vowing to cut off funding for Planned Parenthood after a federal court sided with the state in a challenge over a new law that bans clinics affiliated with abortion providers from getting money through a health program for low-income women.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans late Tuesday reversed a federal judge's temporary injunction that was allowing the funding to continue pending an October trial on Planned Parenthood's challenge to the law.

State officials are seeking to halt money to Planned Parenthood clinics that provide family planning and health services as part of the state's Women's Health Program because the Republican-led Texas Legislature passed a law banning funds to organizations linked to abortion providers.

Planned Parenthood provides services like cancer screenings — but not abortions — to about half of the 130,000 low-income Texas women enrolled in the program, which is designed to provide services to women who might not otherwise qualify for Medicaid.

The appeals court's decision means Texas is now free to impose the ban.

"We appreciate the court's ruling and will move to enforce state law banning abortion providers and affiliates from the Women's Health Program as quickly as possible," Stephanie Goodman, a spokeswoman for the state Health and Human Services Commission, said in a statement.

The ruling is the latest in the ongoing fight that has pitted Texas against the federal government. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services says that the new state rule violates federal law. Federal funds paid for 90 percent, or about $35 million, of the $40 million Women's Health Program until the new rule went into effect. Federal officials are now phasing out support for the program.

Gov. Rick Perry has promised that Texas will make up for the loss of federal funds to keep the program going without Planned Parenthood's involvement. In a statement, Perry called Tuesday's ruling "a win for Texas women, our rule of law and our state's priority to protect life."

"Texas will continue providing important health services for women through this program in spite of the Obama Administration's disregard for our state law and unilateral decision to defund this program," he said.

Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, said the case "has never been about Planned Parenthood — it's about the women who rely on Planned Parenthood for cancer screenings, birth control and well-woman exams."

"It is shocking that politics would get in the way of women receiving access to basic health care," Richards said in a statement.

The case began when Planned Parenthood sued, saying the new Texas law violated its rights to free speech. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott countered by arguing that lawmakers may decide which organizations receive state funds.

A federal judge in Austin ruled that the funding should continue pending the trial on Planned Parenthood's lawsuit, saying there's sufficient evidence the state's law is unconstitutional.

But the three-judge appellate panel disagreed, unanimously finding that Planned Parenthood was unlikely to prevail in future arguments that its free-speech rights were violated.

Abbott cheered the decision, noting that it "rightfully recognized that the taxpayer-funded Women's Health Program is not required to subsidize organizations that advocate for elective abortion."

It comes as conservative groups across the nation try to pass and enforce laws to put Planned Parenthood out of business and make getting an abortion more difficult. Earlier this year the same court upheld a new Texas law requiring doctors to perform a sonogram and provide women with a detailed description of the fetus before carrying out an abortion.

The U.S. District Court in Washington wrote in a 154-page opinion that the maps don't comply with the federal Voting Rights Act because state prosecutors failed to show Texas lawmakers did not draw congressional and state Senate districts "without discriminatory purposes."

The ruling applies to the maps originally drawn by the Legislature in 2011, and not interim maps drawn by a San Antonio federal court that are to be used in the upcoming elections this November.

Luis Vera, an attorney for the League of United Latin American Citizens, called the ruling "better late than never" and a win for his and other minority rights groups that sued the state over the maps.

"The three-judge panel unanimously found intentional discrimination across the state. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about it," Vera said.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott immediately vowed to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

"Today's decision extends the Voting Rights Act beyond the limits intended by Congress and beyond the boundaries imposed by the Constitution," Abbott said in a statement.

How Texas redrew its political boundaries was closely watched after the state was awarded four additional U.S. House seats based on a booming population largely driven by minorities. Those congressional seats were carved equally into two safely Republican and two safely Democratic districts.

A federal court in Washington on Tuesday found evidence of discrimination in new Texas voting maps drawn by the state's Republican-controlled Legislature. Here's a quick look at the decision:

THE ISSUE: The U.S. Department of Justice requires Texas and eight other states with a history of racial discrimination to submit changes to voting maps for review. Rather than seek clearance through the DOJ, Texas asked a federal court in Washington for approval. On Tuesday, the court rejected the maps.

THE DECISION: In a 154-page opinion, the court said the state failed to prove that the maps weren't redrawn with the intent to discriminate. The judges said they found evidence of discrimination in the maps, noting that black congressional members had economic drivers such as sporting arenas carved out of their districts while "no such surgery" occurred in districts with white incumbents.

WHAT'S NEXT: The ruling isn't expected to affect the November elections. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott is vowing to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, since the state argued that the lines were legally drawn in ways to be favorable to Republicans but not with intent to discriminate.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — American-born Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh says the government is forcing him to sin by denying him the right to pray with other Muslims in the highly restricted Indiana prison unit where he is held.

Lindh testified in federal court in Indianapolis Monday as a trial began in his religious-rights lawsuit against the government.

The 31-year-old Lindh says the school of Islam to which he adheres requires Muslims to pray together five times a day, if possible, and stipulates that not praying in a group is a sin.

Lindh says inmates are allowed to do other things in groups outside their cells, but not pray.

Lindh is serving a 20-year sentence at a federal prison in Terre Haute for aiding Afghanistan's now-defunct Taliban government.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Michael Jackson's estate and a businessman working with the singer's mother have settled a copyright infringement case for $2.5 million.

The settlement was announced Tuesday in a Los Angeles federal courthouse right before a trial on damages was scheduled to begin. The estate had sued Howard Mann and his businesses in January 2011, claiming he had violated Jackson copyrights in a book and other merchandise he sold in collaboration with Katherine Jackson.

Mann is the CEO of Vintage Pop Media, which according to settlement terms announced in court is responsible for paying the judgment.

A judge had already ruled that Mann and Vintage Pop Media violated copyrights by using images from the Jackson film "This Is It" and other works.

A jury trial on how much Mann owes the estate had been scheduled to begin Tuesday, with an expert estimating a license for the works is with between $5 and $12 million.