Obama Admin: StemExpess Broke No Laws Selling Aborted Babies Because It Told Us So

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Aug 17, 2015   |   1:29PM   |   Washington, DC

The Obama administration has sent a letter to the U.S. Senate responding to the scandal at Planned Parenthood after expose’ videos showed the abortion business selling aborted babies and their body parts. The letter claims the Department of Health and Human Services and companies like StemExpress that supply aborted baby body parts to research universities broke no laws related to fetal tissue research.

StemExpress is one of a handful of biotech firms that works with Planned parenthood by purchasing aborted babies and their body parts and selling them to scientists at research universities for medical experiments. On Friday, the biotech firm announced it had broken its ties with Planned Parenthood.

Now, the Obama administration appears to be attempting to exonerate itself and the biotech firms as Congress conducts an investigation into the Planned Parenthood scandal.

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As Politico reports:

“Currently, we know of no violation of these laws in connection with the research done at our agencies,” Jim Esquea, assistant secretary for legislation at HHS, wrote in a letter to Sens. Joni Ernst and Roy Blunt, obtained by POLITICO. “Furthermore … we have confirmed that HHS researchers working with fetal tissue obtained the tissue from non-profit organizations that provided assurances to us that they are in compliance with all applicable legal requirements.

HHS has gotten re-affirmations from government researchers and government-funded researchers that their tissue procurement is done in accordance with the tissue laws. And it got assurances from the companies that provide that fetal tissue to researchers at NIH and FDA that they are obtaining the fetal tissue and organs in compliance with federal laws, the letter says.

The federal law that technically prohibits the sale of aborted babies and their body parts was written by a pro-abortion Congressman decades ago and essentially spells out a process by which sellers of aborted baby body parts can meet certain criteria that allows the sales to be legal. That’s why a Colorado congressman has introduced legislation to totally ban the sales of aborted baby body parts.

While the videos have focused on the Planned Parenthood abortion business, the biotech firm StemExpress, which buys and resells aborted baby body parts from the abortion giant, has filed a lawsuit seeking to block some information the Center for Medical Progress obtained in its three year undercover operation.

Last month, a court in California blocked the pro-life group from releasing any videos regarding certain meetings of the middleman, StemExpress.  The restraining order does not apply to the Planned Parenthood abortion business or even to StemExpress in its entirety, making it so additional videos were released.

Then, a Superior Court of the State of California  issued a decision Thursday in StemExpress v. The Center for Medical Progress, which prohibits a biomedical company from accessing the material of an investigative journalist exposing Planned Parenthood’s selling of fetal body parts. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Joanne O’Donnell said the firm is unlikely to prevail in its case to abrogate CMP’s First Amendment rights.

After the initial court decision, CMP talked about why StemExpress was attempting to keep it from releasing additional videos and information.

“StemExpress, a for-profit company partnered with over 30 abortion clinics, including Planned Parenthood, to harvest and sell aborted baby parts and provide a “financial benefit” to Planned Parenthood clinics, is attempting to use meritless litigation to cover-up this illegal baby parts trade, suppress free speech, and silence the citizen press reporting on issues of burning concern to the American public,” CMP said in a statement.

The group continued in its statement to LifeNews: “They are not succeeding—their initial petition was rejected by the court, and their second petition was eviscerated to a narrow and contingent order about an alleged recording pending CMP’s opportunity to respond. The Center for Medical Progress follows all applicable laws in the course of our investigative journalism work and will contest all attempts from Planned Parenthood and their allies to silence our First Amendment rights and suppress investigative journalism.”

As LifeNews reported, the first video of undercover footage shows Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Senior Director of Medical Services, Dr. Deborah Nucatola, describing how Planned Parenthood sells the body parts of aborted unborn children and admitting she uses partial-birth abortions to supply intact body parts.

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In the second video, Planned Parenthood doctor Mary Gatter discusses the pricing of aborted baby body parts — telling the biotech company officials that the prices for such things as a baby’s liver, head or heart are negotiable. She also tells the officials that she could talk with the Planned Parenthood abortion practitioners to potentially alter the abortion procedure to kill the baby in a way that would best preserve those body parts after the unborn child is killed in the abortion.

So far, 12 states have responded to the Planned Parenthood videos and launched investigations into their abortion and organ harvesting business including South Carolina, Florida, Tennessee, Massachusetts, KansasMissouri, Arizona, Indiana, Ohio, Georgia, Texas and Louisiana. The district attorney in Houston Texas is also investigating after the Houston-based Planned Parenthood abortion facility was caught selling aborted babies.

Congress has expanded its investigation into the Planned Parenthood abortion business and five states have revoked taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood’s abortion business, including Utah, Arkansas, Alabama, New Hampshire and Louisiana.

The full, unedited videos have confirmed that revelations that some aborted baby remains sold by Planned Parenthood go to biotech companies for the purpose of creating “humanized” mice. Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood has been exposed as having sold body parts from aborted babies for as much as 15 years.

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