Life Advocacy Briefing

September 26, 2016

Trump Announces ‘Pro-Life Coalition’ / Saluting ‘Hyde’
StemExpress Held in Contempt of Congress / Embracing Dismemberment Ban
On Defense

Trump Announces ‘Pro-Life Coalition’

ONE OF THE TWO MAJOR-PARTY NOMINEES FOR PRESIDENT, Donald Trump (R), released a letter last week announcing the establishment of a “pro-life coalition” to back his campaign and outlining a series of commitments to the pro-life community.

Heading the coalition, according to the Trump campaign letter, is Marjorie Dannenfelser, whose principal pro-life credential is her leadership as president of the pro-life political advocacy group, Susan B. Anthony List (SBA-List).

Noting Mr. Trump’s chief opponent’s declared determination to repeal the long-standing pro-life Hyde Amendment, Mrs. Dannenfelser, in an SBA-List news release, declared: “Not only has Mr. Trump doubled down on his three existing commitments to the pro-life movement, he has gone a step further in pledging to protect the Hyde Amendment and the conscience rights of millions of pro-life taxpayers. … The contrast could not be clearer,” she said, “between the two tickets … .”  Mrs. Dannenfelser went on to declare, “I am proud to serve as national chairwoman for Donald Trump’s Pro-Life Coalition.”

The Dannenfelser appointment was greeted with horror by the left-wing, inappropriately named “People for the American Way” [PAW], which shrieked on its Internet website “Right-Wing Watch,” quoted by Steve Jalsevac of LifeSiteNews.com: “‘Trump’s pick of Dannenfelser to head his campaign’s anti-abortion effort shows just how willing he is to hand his reproductive rights policy over to the anti-choice movement. Dannenfelser is a savvy political operative,’” PAW acknowledged, “‘but she has also been very clear about her ultimate goal: to criminalize abortion in America, without exception.’”

The extremist outfit went on to cite Mrs. Dannenfelser’s response to the passage by the House last year of the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which bars the intentional abortions of babies who have gestated at least 20 weeks. At that time, PAW complains, reports Mr. Jalsevac, “[Mrs.] Dannenfelser said that the bill’s rape exception was ‘regrettable’ and ‘intellectually dishonest,’ saying that she’d like to see all abortions banned at ‘any stage’ of pregnancy. In a press conference,’” wails PAW, as quoted by LifeSiteNews, “[Mrs.] Dannenfelser said that although her group supported the legislation, ‘the rape exception is abominable,’” a judgment in which we at Life Advocacy Briefing certainly concur, when we consider the concept of justice and the ultimate stakes for a baby whose conception results from a sex crime.

In announcing the coalition, whose co-chairmen include former Reagan domestic policy chief Gary Bauer, Mr. Trump declared, “I am committed to: nominating pro-life justices to the US Supreme Court; signing into law the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which would end painful late-term abortions nationwide; defunding Planned Parenthood as long as they continue to perform abortions and reallocating their funding to community health centers that provide comprehensive health care for women; [and] making the Hyde Amendment permanent law to protect taxpayers from having to pay for abortions.”

On-going efforts in Congress to make “Hyde” permanent law have been stymied by the Senate Minority led by retiring Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV). Since the Hyde Amendment was first adopted in 1976 – 40 years ago this month – it has been renewed annually as a provision in the appropriations measure for the Dept. of Health & Human Services.

Though “Hyde” has, for 40 years now, been considered a virtually automatic annual provision, Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and the platform of her party this year have made the blocking of “Hyde” – and consequently the forced subsidization of abortions – a key priority.

In his announcement of his campaign’s “pro-life coalition,” Mr. Trump declared, “Hillary Clinton not only supports abortion on-demand for any reason, but she’d take it a step further; she wants to force the taxpayers to pay for abortions by repealing the bipartisan Hyde Amendment. Hillary Clinton,” the campaign said, “also supports abortion until an hour before birth. And she will only appoint Supreme Court justices who share this view.

“She doesn’t even try to hide her extremism. When asked on Meet the Press when unborn children have constitutional rights, Clinton bluntly responded, ‘The unborn person doesn’t have constitutional rights.’ She is so committed to this view,” the Trump campaign letter asserted, “that she proclaimed in a speech that ‘religious beliefs … have to be changed’ in order to advance her abortion agenda.”

The two candidates are scheduled to engage in their first major televised debate tonight (Monday); the contest will be telecast on all major networks, according to an announcement by NBC News. We hope the Trump pro-life commitment announcement of last week will result in the candidates’ respective positions being raised in the debate so that voters can learn of their contrasting views and so that pro-life voters can examine the Trump commitments for themselves by what he actually says in live debate.

 

Saluting ‘Hyde’

AS SEPTEMBER 30 APPROACHES, pro-life citizens are taking steps to observe the 40th anniversary of the effective date of the celebrated Hyde Amendment, the annual appropriations provision by which unborn American children are shielded from taxpayer-funded destruction.

First proposed by the late, great Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-IL), the provision bars the use of Medicaid funds for abortion and, according to a report which the Charlotte Lozier Institute says it will release on Sept. 30, has preserved the lives of at least one in every nine children born through Medicaid.

As part of its campaign to block the annual renewal of “Hyde,” the abortion lobby’s Center for Reproductive Rights acknowledges, quoted in a LifeSiteNews.com report by Claire Chretien, that “ ‘more than a million women’ have been unable to obtain abortions because of the Hyde Amendment” over the 40 years of its protection.

A pro-life campaign called “#HelloHyde” – apparently, given the punctuation, via the Internet network called “Twitter” – is, reports Ms. Chretien, “collecting photos of people who received prenatal and/or birth care through Medicaid after 1976, when the Hyde Amendment became law, and celebrating their lives.”

The 40th anniversary comes even as the platform of the Democratic Party, for the first time in history, calls not only for repeal of “Hyde” but overtly advocates – as does the leftward party’s Presidential nominee – forcing taxpayers to underwrite the intentional killing of innocent preborn children.

 

StemExpress Held in Contempt of Congress

PLANNED PARENTHOOD’s BABY-PARTS TRAFFICKING PARTNER, StemExpress, has been held “in contempt of Congress,” reports Ben Johnson for LifeSiteNews.com, by the House Select Panel on Infant Lives, the Congressional panel appointed to investigate charges that Planned Parenthood has been engaging in the trafficking of body parts of aborted babies.

The charge was leveled on an 8-to-0 vote when panel Democrats “refused to take part in the final vote,” Mr. Johnson writes, “after multiple attempts to scuttle or delay the vote with procedural motions.” Indeed, Mr. Johnson reports the committee’s Minority Members “storm[ed] out” when they exhausted a variety of tactics to block the vote.

The California “biologic” company was described by Mr. Johnson as “Planned Parenthood’s most conspicuous partner. … A StemExpress brochure given to abortion providers,” Mr. Johnson notes, “promises to furnish ‘financial profits’ and ‘a financial benefit to your clinic.’” Though the use of aborted baby parts for medical research – for which StemExpress apparently functions as middleman – is not expressly illegal, engaging in the harvesting and trafficking of fetal body parts for profit clearly violates federal law, which, notes LifeSiteNews, “makes selling human fetal tissue a federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison or a fine of $500,000 or both.” Therefore, the StemExpress involvement with Planned Parenthood is critical to the panel’s probe.

But StemExpress has repeatedly ignored and evaded the panel’s requests for information and then subpoenas from the official House panel.

Based on reports that the company’s “revenues increased 1,316% between 2010 and 2013,” writes Mr. Johnson, “and more than doubled the following year,” the investigating committee, under the chairmanship of Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) “demanded a full accounting of the company’s finances, its partners, the names of key individuals who oversee its fiscal contracts and bank records,” Mr. Johnson reports. “After an initial inquiry last December,” he writes, “the panel then issued two subpoenas.

“‘Citing non-disclosure agreements,’” said Rep. Blackburn, quoted by Mr. Johnson, “‘StemExpress did not provide the names of its non-public customers or the detailed organization chart or the accounting and banking records. … The panel is entitled to this information,’” she said in the LifeSiteNews report, “‘so that we can answer the question that is raised by the statute: Did companies improperly profit?’”

The chairman noted that “StemExpress continued stonewalling,” writes Mr. Johnson, “even after the committee promised to redact [blacken out] the names.” Chairman Blackburn declared, according to Mr. Johnson, that the panel’s “contempt motion would drive home the fact that ‘a subpoena is not a suggestion. It is a lawful order and must be complied with.’”

Asked Rep. Sean Duffy (R-WI), Mr. Johnson reports: “‘What’s in their records that is so secretive that they won’t comply with a Congressional, lawful subpoena?’”

Responding to the panel’s announcement it would take a vote on the contempt motion, Operation Rescue president Troy Newman, who has carefully watched the ongoing Planned Parenthood scandal, said in a news release, “This is the piece of the puzzle we hoped the Select Panel would uncover. … As with many white-collar crimes, the financial data [are] the key piece of evidence. The fact that [StemExpress owner Cate] Dyer is risking contempt charges to keep this information out of the Select Panel’s hands indicates it must be strongly incriminating to her, her company and her business partners at Planned Parenthood.”

Panel Democrats appeared to be more concerned with fall-out from the ongoing Planned Parenthood fetal parts trafficking scandal, which was touched off by the release, beginning in July 2015, of a series of undercover videos showing the abortion giant’s involvement in the trade.

“Several Democrats said,” writes Mr. Johnson, “the national backlash created by the videos and the Congressional investigation had decreased the number of people willing to be involved in ‘health care and life-saving research’ involving the harvesting of fetal organs. ‘Tissue donations have slowed considerably,’” said panel Democrat Suzan DelBene (D-WA), quoted by LifeSiteNews, “‘since the witch hunt began against Planned Parenthood.’”

Ranking Member Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL) was characteristically more bombastic, calling the probe of StemExpress “‘McCarthyesque,’” notes Mr. Johnson, and “charg[ing] that [Rep.] Blackburn ‘manufactured a controversy over information that she does not need.’” In a Washington Post interview, cited by LifeSiteNews, Rep. Schakowsky vowed, “‘We will fight this continued abuse of Congressional authority every step of the way.’”

The panel’s eight Republican Members are Chairman Blackburn and Representatives Larry Bucshon (IN), Andy Harris (MD), Vicky Hartzler (MO), Joseph Pitts (PA), Diane Black (TN), Mia Love (UT) and Sean Duffy (WI). The Democratic Members on the panel are led by Rep. Janice Schakowsky (IL), Ranking Member, joined by Representatives Jackie Speier (CA), Diana DeGette (CO), Bonnie Watson-Coleman (NJ), Jerrold Nadler (NY) and Suzan DelBene (WA).

The committee’s report is due at the close of this year.

 

Embracing Dismemberment Ban

LEADERS OF THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION (SBC) have endorsed the Dismemberment Abortion Ban recently filed by Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), who is among the estimated 15.29 million members of the major Protestant denomination.

Sen. Lankford’s measure, S-3306, has been referred to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary Committee and is co-sponsored by Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS). It is fashioned after a House-filed Dismemberment Ban, HR-3515, which has been pending in the House Judiciary Committee for the past year and is co-sponsored by 24 House Members, all Republicans.

Russell Moore, president of the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, declared, according to LifeSiteNews.com, “the bill should be supported by ‘all who stand for dignity anywhere. …

“‘This bill is a commonsense measure to protect the unborn, mothers and families from deceptive and manipulative medical practices,’” Mr. Moore said, quoted by LifeSiteNews. “Dismemberment abortion is ‘a callous, gruesome form of human piracy,’” he said, “‘often carried out to satisfy financial greed.’” It is also by far the most common method of abortion past the baby’s first three months of development, prompting fierce opposition to the proposal from the abortion cartel.

Though the proposal has not moved to passage stage on Capitol Hill, it is a key element of the pro-life reform agenda in the states and has received strong backing among state legislators, whose debates on the proposal have helped enlighten the public about the brutal nature of abortion practice.

Dismemberment bans have been enacted in six states during the past two years: Alabama, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Efforts to ban it in Pennsylvania drew radical Gov. Tom Wolf (D) into declaring, reports LifeSiteNews, “banning dismemberment abortions would be ‘a huge step backward.’” Back to the days of Kermit Gosnell, Governor?

 

On Defense

Sept. 9, 2016, commentary by Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious & Civil Rights

Planned Parenthood loves censorship almost as much as it does abortion. For example, it is strongly opposed to parental notification – parents should have no voice in their children’s abortion decisions – and it has long sought to shut down crisis pregnancy centers, the only realistic alternative to abortion in many locales. Now it is at war in California, Alaska and Indiana, trying to censor opposition to its lethal agenda.

In California, Planned Parenthood is trying to increase the penalties for those who distribute secret recordings of healthcare providers. It is still reeling from videotapes taken by the Center for Medical Progress; the footage implicated some employees of the abortion mill in the selling of body parts. A bill awaits Gov. Jerry Brown’s signature that would increase the sanctions for such recordings, but its reach is so broad that it has sparked a backlash from the media and the ACLU. Predictably, Planned Parenthood has shown no interest in addressing the free speech issues involved.

It is also waging war in Alaska, trying to stop parents from removing their children from what they deem are irresponsible sex education programs. Planned Parenthood knows that if parents exercise their rights and sign opt-out releases, it threatens its raison d’etre. Why should the taxpayers fork up a half-billion dollars a year for services the public doesn’t want?

In Indiana, Planned Parenthood has sued the state for its informed consent law. It doesn’t want pregnant women to see the baby they are carrying, preferring to keep them in a state of ignorance. To be blunt, it is scared to death of technology; ultrasound and other scientific advancements allow women to make informed decisions, and that is not something Planned Parenthood can stomach.

The bad news is that we are still paying for Planned Parenthood. The good news is that it is being forced to play defense; our side is just as relentless. Truth will prevail.