ADF, Live Action to Calif. governor, legislature: Defund, investigate Planned Parenthood, StemExpress
ADF letter asks for end to taxpayer funding after video exposes harvesting of organs from baby with beating heart
Tuesday, Aug 25, 2015
Attorney sound bite: Michael J. Norton
SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Alliance Defending Freedom and Live Action sent a letter Monday to California’s governor, speaker of the house, and senate president asking for an investigation of Planned Parenthood and an immediate end to taxpayer funding of the abortion giant (#DefundPP).
Videos from the Center for Medical Progress have identified California’s Planned Parenthood affiliates as having participated in the harvesting and trafficking of aborted baby body parts via StemExpress, a fetal baby parts business headquartered in Placerville.
“No organization that traffics in the hearts, lungs, heads, and livers of unborn babies is entitled to taxpayer dollars. The only thing it’s entitled to is a federal and state investigation,” said ADF Senior Counsel Michael J. Norton. “Taxpayer money should fund local community health centers, not a scandal-plagued billion-dollar corporation. Thousands of community health centers can be trusted with our hard-earned money, while Planned Parenthood has proven for decades that it can’t be trusted.”
“California’s elected officials have a duty to investigate the illegal and unethical practices of abortion giant Planned Parenthood,” said Live Action President Lila Rose. “The evidence in these videos is clear. We urge the governor and legislative leaders to finally hear the cry of Californians and the American people to put an end to public subsidies that fund this organization and its barbaric practices.”
On Aug. 19, CMP released another shocking undercover video, which depicts Holly O’Donnell, a former StemExpress technician, providing an eyewitness account of activities inside a San Jose Planned Parenthood clinic. After an attempted abortion on a well-developed male fetus with a beating heart, O’Donnell’s supervisor reportedly told her that StemExpress was going to harvest the baby’s organs. “Okay, this is a really good fetus, and it looks like we can procure a lot from it,” O’Donnell said the supervisor stated as she demonstrated the gruesome procedure. “We’re going to procure brain.”
“These graphic descriptions vividly explain why Californians, indeed all Americans, are rightly horrified and offended by these barbaric practices that take place inside buildings called ‘health centers,’” the letter explains. “The provision of health care does not include the slicing open of a living baby’s face to harvest his brain and then traffic the brain and other body parts.”
“The Born-Alive Protections Act of 2002 grants equal human rights to any child born alive, at any stage of pregnancy – whether the birth was natural or induced by an attempted abortion,” the letter continues. “Under federal law, therefore, if the child has a heartbeat – as this baby boy in the San Jose Planned Parenthood clinic depicted in this CMP video did have – he had been born alive, and was entitled to all the protections of the law that any other human person is entitled to receive.”
“You don’t have to be a pro-life advocate to agree that illegal activity of this sort should not be tolerated and that Planned Parenthood doesn’t deserve a dime of taxpayer money,” said Kristi L. Brown, one of more than 2,600 private attorneys allied with ADF.
ADF sent a similar letter to the Colorado governor and legislature after CMP released videos exposing Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood negotiating a monetary transaction for aborted baby parts.
Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith.
Videos from the Center for Medical Progress have identified California’s Planned Parenthood affiliates as having participated in the harvesting and trafficking of aborted baby body parts via StemExpress, a fetal baby parts business headquartered in Placerville.
“No organization that traffics in the hearts, lungs, heads, and livers of unborn babies is entitled to taxpayer dollars. The only thing it’s entitled to is a federal and state investigation,” said ADF Senior Counsel Michael J. Norton. “Taxpayer money should fund local community health centers, not a scandal-plagued billion-dollar corporation. Thousands of community health centers can be trusted with our hard-earned money, while Planned Parenthood has proven for decades that it can’t be trusted.”
“California’s elected officials have a duty to investigate the illegal and unethical practices of abortion giant Planned Parenthood,” said Live Action President Lila Rose. “The evidence in these videos is clear. We urge the governor and legislative leaders to finally hear the cry of Californians and the American people to put an end to public subsidies that fund this organization and its barbaric practices.”
On Aug. 19, CMP released another shocking undercover video, which depicts Holly O’Donnell, a former StemExpress technician, providing an eyewitness account of activities inside a San Jose Planned Parenthood clinic. After an attempted abortion on a well-developed male fetus with a beating heart, O’Donnell’s supervisor reportedly told her that StemExpress was going to harvest the baby’s organs. “Okay, this is a really good fetus, and it looks like we can procure a lot from it,” O’Donnell said the supervisor stated as she demonstrated the gruesome procedure. “We’re going to procure brain.”
“These graphic descriptions vividly explain why Californians, indeed all Americans, are rightly horrified and offended by these barbaric practices that take place inside buildings called ‘health centers,’” the letter explains. “The provision of health care does not include the slicing open of a living baby’s face to harvest his brain and then traffic the brain and other body parts.”
“The Born-Alive Protections Act of 2002 grants equal human rights to any child born alive, at any stage of pregnancy – whether the birth was natural or induced by an attempted abortion,” the letter continues. “Under federal law, therefore, if the child has a heartbeat – as this baby boy in the San Jose Planned Parenthood clinic depicted in this CMP video did have – he had been born alive, and was entitled to all the protections of the law that any other human person is entitled to receive.”
“You don’t have to be a pro-life advocate to agree that illegal activity of this sort should not be tolerated and that Planned Parenthood doesn’t deserve a dime of taxpayer money,” said Kristi L. Brown, one of more than 2,600 private attorneys allied with ADF.
ADF sent a similar letter to the Colorado governor and legislature after CMP released videos exposing Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood negotiating a monetary transaction for aborted baby parts.
Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith.
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