Planned Parenthood officials defending the taxpayer funding the abortion business enjoys are out with a new claim that pro-life advocates find laughable as a supposed reason for federal dollars.
Last week, Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards made the false claim that Planned Parenthood abortion centers do mammograms and that was a reason to protect its federal funding. Now, Tait Sye, a spokesman for Planned Parenthood, told Community Television of Southern California: “If we are defunded, America’s emergency rooms will be overrun.”
David Schmidt, the media director of Live Action, the group that released undercover videos showing Planned Parenthood staffers willing to arrange abortions for girls victimized in sex trafficking and which helped expose the false mammogram claim, responded to the latest assertion in comments to LifeNews.com.
“This is the latest attempt by Planned Parenthood to overstate their case for retaining taxpayer funding. Planned Parenthood does not provide emergency services and so an elimination of their taxpayer subsidy will not “overrun” the nation’s emergency rooms,” he said. “What we can be expecting to see is that the approximately 7,000 federally qualified health centers across America will receive some additional clients who previously went to Planned Parenthood.”
“Observing Planned Parenthood make such an outrageous claim shows how they are willing to jump beyond sound logic and reason in a desperation attempt to retain their federal pipeline of funds,” Schmidt added. “Our nation deserves a truthful debate about whether Planned Parenthood should be funded and wildly inaccurate and unfounded fear-based statements from Planned Parenthood does not serve that vital public discussion.”
Paul Pauker, a Live Action blogger, also responded to the claim concerning emergency rooms supposedly receiving a massive amount of patients if the abortion business stops getting taxpayer money from the federal government.
“Why exactly will emergency rooms be overrun?” Pauker asked. “Planned Parenthood doesn’t provide emergency room services. And who goes to an emergency room to get an abortion, STD test, birth control, or Pap smear? This wouldn’t be another false claim by Planned Parenthood, would it? Planned Parenthood will do and say nearly anything to keep those tax dollars coming. I wonder what they’ll think up next week?”
He agreed with Schmidt that women would likely go to “the approximately 7,000 federally funded health centers in the United States that provide more comprehensive care than Planned Parenthood offers.”
Pauker also pointed to an editorial Rep. Mike Pence, the sponsor of the amendment yanking federal funding from the abortion business, wrote about what would happen if the amendment becomes law.
Pence explains: “Despite efforts to suggest otherwise, the Pence Amendment does not reduce funding for cancer screenings or eliminate one dime of funding for other important health services to women; the money that does not go to Planned Parenthood as a result of the Pence Amendment will go to other organizations that provide these services. If the Pence Amendment becomes law, thousands of women’s health centers, clinics, and hospitals will still provide assistance to low-income families and women. The Pence Amendment would simply deny any and all federal funding to Planned Parenthood.”
