Bill Would Make Obama’s International Taxpayer Funding of Abortions Permanent

International   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Mar 19, 2010   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Bill Would Make Obama’s International Taxpayer Funding of Abortions Permanent

by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
March 19
, 2010

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Remember the Mexico City Policy? Most Americans are caught up in the monumental debate over health care and abortion funding and they may have forgotten about how President Barack Obama, during his first week in office, used their tax dollars to pay for performing and promoting abortions overseas.

But Rep. Nita Lowey hasn’t forgotten.

The new York Democrat and prominent abortion activist in the House has unveiled new legislation designed to make permanent Obama’s executive order revoking the Mexico City Policy.

During the administrations of President Reagan and both Bush presidents, the Mexico City Policy made it so organizations that received money from USAID could not use the funds to pay for abortions. They were also prohibited from paying for lobbying efforts designed to get pro-life nations across the world to weaken their laws prohibiting abortions.

Instead, the pro-life presidents limits the funds to legitimate groups conducting legitimate efforts to help the needy in faraway nations.

Planned Parenthood refused to abide by the Mexico City Policy limits and lost out on the millions of dollars it could have had by backing down on promoting abortions.

Naturally, the abortion business praised Lowey’s bill to make Obama’s taxpayer funding of abortions permanent.

"Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) today commended Congresswoman Nita Lowey (D-NY) for introducing the Global Democracy Promotion Act of 2010 to bar future administrations from re-instituting the so-called Mexico City policy," it said in a statement LifeNews.com obtained.

The group’s president, Cecile Richards, decried having to make the "dangerous choice" of deciding whether or not to provide legitimate health care or poor women worldwide and advocating abortions.

“Through the Global Democracy Promotion Act, future administrations would be prohibited from" protecting taxpayers from paying for abortion advocacy, she applauded.

After Obama forced taxpayers to finance the abortion agenda, his friends in Congress — sensing a rare opportunity after an election that gave them ironclad control over Congress — have already sought to make his executive order permanent.

By putting Obama’s mandate into federal law, a pro-life president potentially defeating Obama in 2012 could not go into office the next year and undo his decision. Only by Congress approving a new law could the Mexico City Policy be restored — a monumental uphill battle given the losing votes in Congress earlier this year in an attempt to restore it.

Led by pro-abortion Sen. Frank Lautenberg, a New jersey Democrat, abortion advocates snuck such a law into the Senate State, Foreign Operations bill.

The Senate Appropriations Committee passed the Lautenberg amendment on a 17-11 vote with Democrats supporting it and Republicans in opposition.

The House version of the same bill did not include the Lautenberg amendment, but it was added to the omnibus bill a conference committee approved earlier this week.

Leading pro-life advocates in the Senate wasted no time in telling leaders in Congress that they would filibuster the bill with the language overturning the Mexico City Policy attached.

Ironically, while Lautenberg debated keeping massive abortion funding in the government-run health care bill, Douglas Johnson of National Right to Life helped get the provision removed from the omnibus.

"While Sen. Lautenberg was on the Senate floor speaking against the Nelson-Hatch Amendment, and demonstrating his inability to distinguish between taking a pill to improve sexual performance and dismembering an unborn human being, National Right to Life was hard at work deep-sixing Lautenberg’s amendment to create an entitlement for overseas groups that promote abortion," Johnson told LifeNews.com on Thursday.

"That effort was successful — the Lautenberg Amendment (which would have operated as a permanent ban on a pro-life policy such as the Mexico City Policy) was dropped by conferees from the omnibus appropriations bill," he said

A February Gallup poll found strong majority of Americans are upset that Obama would send their tax money overseas to perform and promote abortions.

It found 58 percent of Americans opposed Obama’s pro-abortion decision while just 35 percent supported it and 7 percent had no opinion.

Breaking down the new poll further, Gallup asked respondents to state their opinion on seven major actions President Obama has taken since becoming president. Overturning the Mexico City Policy engendered more opposition than any of the other actions and it had the lowest level of support.

The pro-abortion move also evoked the least support from Democrats and the most opposition from Republicans and independents.

While 59 percent of Democrats supported the move, it came in last among the seven total issues on which Gallup surveyed.

Only 8 percent of Republicans backed overturning the limits as did just 33 percent of the independent voters surveyed — with opposition higher about this action than any other Obama has taken a president.

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