President
Bush instituted polices that may have saved the lives of many unborn babies.
One of his first official acts as President in 2001 was to reinstitute a policy
denying federal funding to international groups that provide abortions. He
opposed taxpayer funding for most stem cell research. And he signed a bill
which outlawed the barbaric practice of partial birth abortion.
So would
you be surprised if I told you that the Bush administration, under the auspices
of the Department of Health and Human Services, has provided billions of dollars
to the pro-abortion group Planned Parenthood?
That's why
we decided to find out everything we could about the Bush administration's
funding of Planned Parenthood, including what restrictions, if any, have been
placed on how this money is spent. On August 14, 2008, Judicial Watch filed a
Freedom of Information Act request with the Department of Health and Human
Services. When HHS stonewalled, we filed a lawsuit. (Check it out here.)
Here's
what we're after:
- All records concerning the allocation and distribution
of public funds to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc.
(henceforth referred to as Planned Parenthood).
- All records detailing the policies, procedures, and
operational practices of Planned Parenthood, including but not limited to
records concerning the use of public funds to provide health care or
educational services.
- Any and all records pertaining to the Department of
Health and Human Service's decision to provide funding to Planned
Parenthood, including but not limited to records detailing the use of
government money, and/or any conditions or stipulations regarding the use
of said money.
Incredibly,
the Bush administration provides approximately $300 million in annual taxpayer
funding for Planned Parenthood through Title X (Ten), a program run by the
Department of Health and Human Services.
Now,
pro-abortion advocates and defenders of the Title X policy say that the funds
are not to be used directly for abortion-related services, that there is a
"strict wall of separation" between funds for "family
planning" and funds for "abortion." There is some doubt as to
whether or not this is true, which is one reason we filed our FOIA request.
Even if you accept this argument at face value, this is a distinction without a
difference. Certainly every dollar allocated by the federal government to
Planned Parenthood for so-called "family planning" services frees up
another dollar to be used by Planned Parenthood to provide abortions.
As
President Elect Obama is a fanatic supporter of abortion rights and, among
other acts, pledges to reverse the prohibition on taxpayer money for
organizations that promote abortion abroad, the issue of taxpayer funding of
abortion could reach fever pitch over the next year.