July 23, 2015
In the wake of two undercover videos exposing Planned Parenthood executives’ nonchalance in discussing prices for “donated” baby body parts, momentum is increasing in Congress to defund the organization, which is the leading provider of abortions in the U.S.
But it’s not just Congress that Planned Parenthood has to worry about.
Kansas became the eighth state Wednesday to also open an investigation into the abortion provider.
Gov. Sam Brownback made the following statement:
“Kansas remains committed to a culture that respects the dignity of life at all stages. Recent videos show Planned Parenthood employees treating the unborn as commodities as they discuss the sale of tissue and organs. This does not reflect the culture of life most Kansans want.”
Brownback follows Republican governors in Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Ohio, Indiana, Arizona and Missouri in launching similar probes.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbot said, after the second video was released: “Today’s new grotesque revelations necessitate that Texas expand its investigation into this abhorrent practice.”
Brownback called on the Kansas Board of Healing Arts, with the co-operation of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, “to investigate, as part of its inspection of office-based surgical practices, whether any Kansas facility is engaged in the inhumane practice of selling tissue and organs from unborn children who are aborted.”
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal issued a statement saying the Department of Community Health and Department of Public Health will conduct a joint review of the clinics “to ensure this horrific practice is not occurring here.”
Republican leaders in Congress are weighing a series of votes to defund Planned Parenthood — possibly beginning before the August recess — after the release of a second undercover sting video allegedly showing one of the abortion rights group’s officials discussing the sale of fetal organs. Planned Parenthood refers to the transfers as “donations” that covers its “costs” of aborting the babies.
House Speaker John Boehner is “demanding” that President Obama back a full-blown investigation into Planned Parenthood after a second undercover video released Tuesday appears to show a top official callously haggling over reimbursement fees for “specimen” samples and even joking with actors posing as buyers that she wants “a Lamborghini.”
“This new video is as sickening, disturbing and callous as the last video. It’s now clear that Planned Parenthood allows this horrifying conduct to happen throughout its organization,” Boehner said of the second hidden-camera video released in as many weeks by the pro-life Center for Medical Progress.
“Last week, I called on Congress to investigate these gruesome practices. The Energy & Commerce and Judiciary Committees have begun immediate investigations and I look forward to their prompt and thorough action.
“President Obama still has not denounced these horrific practices,” Boehner said. “He has a responsibility to also speak out immediately and stop these practices now.”
Boehner’s own pro-life record is spotty. In September 2014, he led the way in getting a “clean” bill passed that would fund the government for the entire year, including more than half-a-billion dollars in funding for Planned Parenthood. Boehner worked with former Democrat Speaker Nancy Pelosi to get that legislation passed by a 319 to 108 margin.
More than 55 million unborn babies have been aborted in the U.S. since the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade ruling in 1973.
Planned Parenthood, in its most recent annual report, said it received $528.4 million in taxpayer finding in the 2013-14 fiscal year.
That means it received an average of $1,447,671 in taxpayer funds per day and an average of $60,320 every hour.
But the government is not the only place Planned Parenthood gets its money.
There are also 39 companies that donate directly to the abortion provider, as reported by the Daily Signal.
The companies donating directly to Planned Parenthood are:
1. Adobe
2. American Cancer Society
3. American Express
4. AT&T
5. Avon
6. Bank of America
7. Bath & Body Works
8. Ben & Jerry’s
9. Clorox
10. Coca-Cola
11. Converse
12. Deutsche Bank
13. Dockers
14. Energizer
15. Expedia
16. ExxonMobil
17. Fannie Mae
18. Groupon
19. Intuit
20. Johnson & Johnson
21. La Senza
22. Levi Strauss
23. Liberty Mutual
24. Macy’s
25. March of Dimes
26. Microsoft
27. Morgan Stanley
28. Nike
29. Oracle
30. PepsiCo
31. Pfizer
32. Progressive
33. Starbucks
34. Susan G. Komen
35. Tostitos
36. Unilever
37. United Way
38. Verizon
39. Wells Fargo
The undercover videos were produced by the Center for Medical Progress, a nonprofit “group of citizen journalists dedicated to monitoring and reporting on medical ethics and advances.”
“Over the last week, we’ve seen multiple videos showing its employees brazenly discussing the harvesting of aborted babies’ tissue and organs, but the truth is, Planned Parenthood’s culture of depravity runs much deeper than a couple of videos,” said Rep. Diane Black, R-Tenn., on the House floor Tuesday night.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee began investigating the matter last week.
“As a nurse, I’ve seen the big abortion industry’s shameful tactics with my own eyes,” Black said. “I have just introduced the Defund Planned Parenthood Act of 2015 – legislation that would enact an immediate moratorium on all federal funding for Planned Parenthood while Congress carries out a full investigation.”
The bill has 80 co-sponsors.
If the legislation clears Congress, it will await a presidential veto.
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told The Blaze this week that the administration would not reconsider federal funding for Planned Parenthood.
The first video featured the executive director of Planned Parenthood’s medical services discussing body parts with an undercover actor posing as a representative from a bio-research company. The executive in the first video also openly discussed the use of partial-birth abortion, which is illegal.
“The horrific and illegal acts described so callously by Planned Parenthood in yesterday’s video should give even the most ardent pro-choice advocate cause for grave concern. We urge Georgia’s lawmakers to acknowledge the gravity of this evidence and launch an investigation to ensure this is not happening in Georgia,” Georgia Alliance for Life director Emily Matson told LifeNews.com in an email.
But pro-abortion groups and left-wing media types have been expressing anything by “grave concern.”
Consider this YouTube video from the Young Turks, in which a young woman and her male newscast partner express outrage and disbelief that anyone would take the two videos seriously.
