Life Advocacy Briefing

Time to Work on the Senate

PRO-LIFE CITIZENS CELEBRATING THE HOUSE VOTE to defund Planned Parenthood have a mountain to climb in the US Senate, where liberal Democrats continue to hold the majority.

Yet the scandals which have broken over the abortion profiteers in the past several weeks offer an opportunity to advocate for starting needed federal spending cuts with the Pence Amendment to bar funding to Planned Parenthood Federation of America and to any and all of its enumerated affiliates.

Calls are needed now to urge Senators to back the Pence Amendment in order to protect girls and women. Senators may be reached via the Capitol switchboard at 1-202/224-3121 or, by electronic mail, through the Internet website at www.senate.gov.

As Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, put it: “Ending taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood is a non-negotiable. … Americans have spoken, and the time to defund Planned Parenthood, a habitual and unapologetic ally of those who deal in the exploitation of minors, is now.”

Obama Regime Weakens Conscience Protections

WHILE THE U.S. HOUSE WAS DEBATING PRO-LIFE REFORMS in the Continuing Resolution providing appropriations to continue the 2011 Fiscal Year, the Obama Regime was busily stripping conscience protections from medical providers.

“Left in place,” writes Charlie Butts for OneNewsNow.com, “are protections only for those who object to abortion and sterilization, but little else. … The new rules,” writes Mr. Butts, “do not provide conscience protection for medical professionals who object to birth control or the ‘morning-after’ pills,” though many pro-life professionals and citizens believe chemical contraception – including morning-after pills – act as abortifacients.

“The ruling is a victory for Planned Parenthood and other ‘family planning’ groups,” writes Peter Smith for LifeSiteNews.com, “that have insisted that drugs like Plan-B (taken within 72 hours of sexual intercourse) and Ella (taken with five days of intercourse) should be defined as ‘contraception.’ Pro-life groups,” writes Mr. Smith, “countered that pro-life health providers should be protected from discrimination under federal statutes, because these drugs could prevent a conceived human embryo from implanting in the mother’s womb, thereby aborting it.”

The new rules also weaken the enforcement mechanism adopted in 2008, when the conscience rule was formulated by then-Secretary of Health & Human Services (HHS) Mike Leavitt, based on volumes of public comment. (A statement by Obama HHS Secy. Kathleen Sebelius acknowledges, reports Mr. Smith, “that the vast majority of 300,000 comments received by HHS since they announced their proposal to rescind the 2008 Final Rule were overwhelmingly against rescinding: 187,000 comments” backed retaining the carefully drawn Leavitt rule.)

The enforcement provision promulgated under Mrs. Sebelius, reports Mr. Smith, “rescinds the requirement that recipients of certain HHS funds provide certification of their compliance with laws protecting provider conscience rights. Instead,” reports LifeSiteNews, “the HHS will just amend the grant writing process so healthcare organizations can stipulate that they understand and will comply with federally mandated conscience protections.

Dr. J. Scott Ries, a spokesman for the Christian Medical Assn., writes Mr. Butts, “sees nothing but bad resulting from this move. ‘If the Obama Administration is successful in diminishing the right of a physician – or any healthcare worker, for that matter – to have a conscience in their practice, this is going to profoundly impact health care in our country,’” said Dr. Ries in the OneNewsNow report.

Pro-life groups said the new HHS conscience rule, reports LifeSiteNews, “would end up hurting doctors and other health professionals, who would choose to leave their fields rather than betray their moral or religious convictions.” (Could this be the objective?)

“‘Losing conscientious healthcare professionals and faith-based institutions to discrimination and job loss especially imperils the poor and patients in medical underserved areas,’” said Dr. Ries as quoted by Mr. Smith in the LifeSiteNews story. “‘We are already facing critical shortages of primary care physicians,’” he said, “‘and the Obama Administration’s decision now threatens to make the situation far worse for patients across the country who depend on faith-based health care.’”

Dr. Ries objects also to the excuse the Administration has advanced in gutting the conscience rule. “‘In the last two years, the Bush rule has been in place,’” he said, quoted by Mr. Butts, “‘and there’s been no evidence of lack of access for women to have health care, to have their needed contraception. None at all,’ he points out,” writes Mr. Butts. “‘Yet they cite this as one of their main reasons as to why they’re overturning parts of the Bush rule.’”

The regulatory action cut short an effort by Rep. John Fleming (R-LA) to protect the Bush/Leavitt conscience rules. As we reported in last week’s Life Advocacy Briefing, Dr. Fleming had to withdraw his conscience-rule amendment to the Continuing Resolution when he learned the Obama forces had pushed forward their new, weakened conscience rule; ironically, had he continued with his amendment, Rep. Fleming would have found himself in the awful position of sealing the Obama rule into place rather than the Leavitt rule he had intended to protect.

Bernard Nathanson, R.I.P.

HE WAS ONCE AMONG THE NATION’s MOST PROLIFIC ABORTIONISTS and a key founder and strategist of the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL). But the reality of the biology of “the fetus” – thanks, no doubt, to the Holy Spirit – reached and taught his conscience, and Bernard Nathanson MD washed his hands of his dirty trade and became a leading advocate in the cause of Life.

Last week, he slipped into eternity after years of courageous, tireless leadership as a champion for truth and a priceless witness to the soul-starved perfidy of the abortion profiteers. May he rest in peace.

Offering the Amendment to Defund Planned Parenthood

House Floor speech by Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), sponsor of Amendment 11 to HR-1, retyped from Congressional Record

Mr. Chairman, I believe that ending an innocent human life is morally wrong. But I rise tonight because I also believe it’s morally wrong to take the taxpayer dollars of millions of pro-life Americans and use it to fund organizations that provide and promote abortion – like Planned Parenthood of America. The American people deserve to know that Planned Parenthood is not only the largest abortion provider in America, Planned Parenthood is also the largest recipient of taxpayer funding under Title X [Ten].

According to their latest annual report, Planned Parenthood received more than $363 million in taxpayer money while boasting of having performed an unprecedented 324,008 abortions during the same period.

The amendment that I bring to the floor tonight would deny any and all funding to Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its affiliates for the rest of the fiscal year. But let me be clear. This amendment would not cut funding for health services. It would simply block those funds already in the bill from subsidizing America’s largest abortion provider.

Now I am aware that Title X family planning funds are eliminated in this [underlying] bill. But eliminating Title X funding has never been my goal. I support the important work of Title X clinics across the country. The reality is that Planned Parenthood receives hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars from federal funding sources other than Title X, and our effort tonight is specifically to focus on denying any and all federal funding to the largest abortion provider in America.

The reasons for doing so are many. The case for defunding Planned Parenthood has made headlines for years. In 2002, Planned Parenthood was found civilly liable in Arizona for failure to report statutory rape.

Since that time, Planned Parenthood affiliates have been found violating reporting laws in Indiana and California, and found to have violated statutory reporting laws in places like Ohio.

Recently in California, Washington, New Jersey and New York, Planned Parenthood clinics have been accused of fraudulent accounting over billing practices.

And, of course, last week as the nation watched in horror, new undercover videos were released that showed Planned Parenthood employees in multiple states apparently willing to aid human sex traffickers by coaching them on how to falsify documents to secure secret abortions for underage prostitutes.

As the father of two teenage daughters, there are not words strong enough to portray my contempt for this pattern of fraud and abuse against young women by Planned Parenthood, and that’s what brings us here today.

Now I know that some consider this amendment to be something of a war on Planned Parenthood. But this is not about Planned Parenthood’s right to be in the abortion business. Sadly, abortion on demand is legal in America. This is about who pays for it. Nobody is saying that Planned Parenthood can’t be the leading advocate of abortion on demand in America, but why do I have to pay for it? Nobody is saying that Planned Parenthood can’t continue to be the largest abortion provider in America. But why do tens of millions of pro-life American taxpayers have to pay for it?

Let me be clear as I come to the floor. I long for the day that Roe v. Wade is sent to the ash heap of history, when we move past the broken hearts and the broken lives of the past 38 years. But as this debate rages on, I call on my colleagues in both parties:

Let’s at least respect what has been the historic and overwhelming consensus of the American people: that we ought not use their taxpayer dollars to provide for or promote abortion at home and abroad. Let’s end taxpayer support for abortion providers, specifically Planned Parenthood, once and for all.

I urge my colleagues to take a stand for taxpayers and to take a stand for Life, to take a stand against a pattern of corruption and to take a stand for young women in crisis pregnancies, who deserve access to unbiased and compassionate healthcare services.

Let’s end the taxpayer support of Planned Parenthood. The Pence Amendment’s purpose is to do simply that and, in so doing, to stand with the American people, to stand with the American taxpayer, and to stand without apology for the sanctity of human life.

House Voting Record

Procedural motion to recommit HR-1 to committee, seeking to block consideration of the pro-life-reform-laden Continuing Resolution for Fiscal Year 2011 – Feb. 19, 2011 – Rejected 186 – 238 (Democrats in italics)

Voting “no” / pro-Life: AL/Aderholt, Bachus, Bonner, Brooks, Roby, Rogers; AK/Young; AZ/Flake, Franks, Gosar, Schweikert; AR/Crawford, Griffin, Womack; CA/Bilbray, Bono-Mack, Calvert, Campbell, Denham, Dreier, Gallegly, Herger, Hunter, Issa, Lewis, Lungren, McCarthy, McClintock, McKeon, Gary Miller, Nunes, Rohrabacher, Royce; CO/Coffman, Gardner, Lamborn, Tipton; FL/Adams, Bilirakis, Buchanan, Crenshaw, Diaz-Balart, Mack, Mica, Miller, Nugent, Posey, Rivera, Rooney, Ros-Lehtinen, Ross, Southerland, Stearns, Webster, West, Young; GA/Broun, Gingrey, Graves, Kingston, Price, Austin Scott, Westmoreland, Woodall; ID/Labrador, Simpson; IL/Biggert, Dold, Hultgren, Johnson, Kinzinger, Manzullo, Roskam, Schilling, Schock, Shimkus, Walsh; IN/Bucshon, Burton, Pence, Rokita, Stutzman, Young; IA/King, Latham; KS/Huelskamp, Jenkins, Pompeo, Yoder; KY/Davis, Guthrie, Rogers, Whitfield; LA/Alexander, Boustany, Cassidy, Fleming, Landry, Scalise; MD/Bartlett, Harris; MI/Amash, Benishek, Camp, Huizenga, McCotter, Miller, Rogers, Upton, Walberg; MN/Bachmann, Cravaack, Kline, Paulsen; MS/Harper, Nunnelee, Palazzo; MO/Akin, Emerson, Graves, Hartzler, Long, Luetkemeyer; MT/Rehberg; NE/Fortenberry, Smith, Terry; NV/Heck, Heller; NH/Bass, Guinta; NJ/Frelinghuysen, Garrett, Lance, LoBiondo, Runyan, Smith; NM/Pearce; NY/Buerkle, Gibson, Grimm, Hanna, Hayworth, King, Reed; NC/Coble, Ellmers, Foxx, Jones, McHenry, Myrick; ND/Berg; OH/Austria, Chabot, Gibbs, Johnson, Jordan, LaTourette, Latta, Renacci, Schmidt, Stivers, Tiberi, Turner; OK/Cole, Lankford, Lucas, Sullivan; OR/Walden; PA/Barletta, Dent, Fitzpatrick, Gerlach, Kelly, Marino, Meehan, Murphy, Pitts, Platts, Shuster, Thompson; SC/Duncan, Gowdy, Mulvaney, Tim Scott, Wilson; SD/Noem; TN/Black, Blackburn, DesJarlais, Duncan, Fincher, Fleischmann, Roe; TX/Barton, Brady, Burgess, Canseco, Carter, Conaway, Culberson, Farenthold, Flores, Gohmert, Granger, Hall, Hensarling, Sam Johnson, Marchant, McCaul, Neugebauer, Olson, Poe, Sessions, Smith, Thornberry; UT/Bishop, Chaffetz; VA/Cantor, Forbes, Goodlatte, Griffith, Hurt, Rigell, Wittman, Wolf; WA/Hastings, Herrera-Beutler, McMorris-Rodgers, Reichert; WV/Capito, McKinley; WI/Duffy, Petri, Ribble, Ryan, Sensenbrenner; WY/Lummis.

Voting “yes” / anti-Life: AL/Sewell; AZ/Grijalva, Pastor; AR/Ross; CA/Baca, Bass, Becerra, Berman, Capps, Cardoza, Chu, Costa, Davis, Eshoo, Farr, Filner, Garamendi, Honda, Lee, Lofgren, Matsui, McNerney, George Miller, Napolitano, Pelosi, Richardson, Roybal-Allard, Linda Sanchez, Loretta Sanchez, Schiff, Sherman, Speier, Thompson, Waters, Waxman, Woolsey; CO/DeGette, Perlmutter, Polis; CT/Courtney, DeLauro, Himes, Larson, Murphy; DE/Carney; FL/Brown, Castor, Deutch, Hastings, Wasserman-Schultz; GA/Barrow, Bishop, Johnson, Lewis, David Scott; HI/Hanabusa, Hirono; IL/Costello, Davis, Gutierrez, Jackson, Lipinski, Quigley, Rush, Schakowsky; IN/Carson, Donnelly, Visclosky; IA/Boswell, Braley, Loebsack; KY/Chandler, Yarmuth; LA/Richmond; ME/Michaud, Pingree; MD/Cummings, Edwards, Hoyer, Ruppersberger, Sarbanes, VanHollen; MA/Capuano, Frank, Keating, Lynch, Markey, McGovern, Neal, Olver, Tierney, Tsongas; MI/Clarke, Conyers, Dingell, Kildee, Levin; MN/Ellison, Peterson, Walz; MS/Thompson; MO/Carnahan, Clay, Cleaver; NV/Berkley; NJ/Andrews, Holt, Pallone, Pascrell, Payne, Rothman, Sires; NM/Heinrich, Lujan; NY/Ackerman, Bishop, Clarke, Crowley, Engel, Higgins, Hinchey, Israel, Lowey, Maloney, McCarthy, Meeks, Nadler, Owens, Rangel, Serrano, Slaughter, Tonko, Towns, Velazquez, Weiner; NC/Butterfield, Kissell, McIntyre, Miller, Price, Shuler, Watt; OH/Fudge, Kaptur, Kucinich, Ryan, Sutton; OK/Boren; OR/Blumenauer, DeFazio, Schrader, Wu; PA/Altmire, Brady, Critz, Doyle, Fattah, Holden, Schwartz; RI/Cicilline, Langevin; SC/Clyburn; TN/Cohen, Cooper; TX/Cuellar, Doggett, Gonzalez, Al Green, Gene Green, Jackson-Lee, E.B. Johnson, Reyes; UT/Matheson; VT/Welch; VA/Connolly, Moran, Scott; WA/Dicks, Inslee, Larsen, McDermott, Smith; WV/Rahall; WI/Baldwin, Kind, Moore.

Not voting: AZ/Giffords, Quayle; CA/Harman, Stark; FL/Wilson; MI/Peters; MN/McCollum; OH/Boehner; TX/Hinojosa, Paul.

March for Life Speeches

Congressional speeches delivered at the Jan. 24, 2011, March for Life, transcribed by Life Advocacy Briefing from EWTN television coverage; more to follow in future editions.

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI): When I was the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, we wrote and passed a ban on partial-birth abortions that was held constitutional by the US Supreme Court. That’s the only time since Roe v. Wade that the Supreme Court has actually restricted abortion. The rest of the stuff has always been on the periphery. We tried last year to prevent ObamaCare from including abortion coverage, and we lost at the last minute because of some switches of members, some of whom are not with us any more because they sold out Life. This year we ask all of you to back HR-3. This will shut the door permanently once and for all to having your tax dollars be used to fund elective abortions. Abortion is wrong, but it is just as wrong to force people who morally object to abortion to pay taxes for this insidious procedure. That’s our job in the next two years. The House will pass HR-3. Let’s all get to work on the Senate.

Permission granted to quote with attribution. Reproduction rights granted only by express authorization.